


The Little Liar and the Blue Bird (of Happiness)

by Starlight_Adventurer



Category: One Piece
Genre: First OP fic yay, Fluff and Angst, I want him to have nice things, Marco gets a son, Most of which are OCs, There will be sad, Usopp gets a new Father Figure, bc he deserves it, i apologise in advance, mild reference to child abuse, nothing explicit but i'd rather be safe than sorry with tagging
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-07-16
Updated: 2021-01-10
Packaged: 2021-03-05 06:47:57
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 11
Words: 53,218
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25320028
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Starlight_Adventurer/pseuds/Starlight_Adventurer
Summary: Two people start journeys across the sea for two very different reasons, but a meeting of chance has them come together for an adventure that will change their outlook on life.Marco is a man fighting to help his family with powers he no longer has. Usopp is a boy without a family trying to find himself in the world.Through working together, they may find that they need each other more than either of them expected...
Comments: 56
Kudos: 88





	1. Trapping of a Blue Bird

**Author's Note:**

> This started as an idea to explore Usopp's character with a father figure and to have him and Marco interact with each other. I have no idea what will come of this but here we are.

Normalcy at sea.

It was an odd concept for anyone sailing the ocean’s vast waters; the five oceans could boast about being an ever-changing landscape of blue but anyone who truly knew the seas would simply say that this was a hollow bluff from their one true home. The truth of the matter is that an average day at sea was an obtainable thing if one learned to take every unusual thing that happened as a part of life.

Life on the Moby Dick was no different. They might be gently sailing along a crystal clear ocean one moment before finding an island full of plants with a taste for human flesh the next. Any seasoned member of the crew knew to take any new day in stride on their journey through the New World.

So, that was just what Marco was doing as he took a moment of quiet in his room to charter the next part of their journey. He felt all the tension caused by events from many weeks prior to that moment slip away along the expanse of the map in front of him. Peace and solitude to fix his frayed nerves; what more could he ask for out of a day at sea?

“Commander!”

Perhaps that thought came too soon for the universe, Marco sighed while he rolled up the map (lest it be ruined in the commotion to come). This task was completed in time for one of his men to come barreling through his door with something clasped in his hand. The crewman, a man by the name of Apis, was out of breath, forehead creased in obvious confusion, with wide eyes as he flapped his arms around and panicked, “Commander! I need permission to return home for a little while. Please! It’s an emergency!”

Marco raised an eyebrow at the man in front of him, being unused to seeing any of his men in a state that could be described as anywhere near frenzied, then asked, “Did something happen? What’s that in your hand-yoi?”

The man stopped flailing to take notice of the object held tightly in his grasp. He held it out for Marco to take, with the commander doing just that, while he explained, only slightly calmer than a moment before, “It was tucked into the morning newspaper. Don’t know how it got there, sir, but it was addressed to me so I opened it. Can’t say I’m too happy about what was inside.”

Marco flipped over the letter in his hand, finding the name of Apis written in a delicate looking font, then opened it. The enclosed letter was scribed in the same way as the envelope, but what made Marco pause was how little was actually contained within the writing on the page:

To my dearest Honey Bee,

We haven’t seen each other for a very long time, I miss you so and our sweet daughter feels the same. I fear that I may no longer love you if you do not come home soon, as a rich man has moved to the village and is quite taken with us. Should you fail to visit within the next month then I have no choice but to let him sweep me off my feet.

Yours,  
Violet

“‘Honey Bee’? Really-yoi? You want to take a ship because your wife is leaving you?” Marco didn’t mean to sound blunt, but he wouldn’t class it as an emergency.

“No, sir!” Apis denied with a hurried gesture towards the letter, “It’s just, my wife didn’t write this and I think she’s in danger.”

“Alright… You said that this letter came out of our newspaper?” His question was answered with a frantic nod. “And your wife would have no way of doing this? No connections to the World Economy?”

“We lived on a small island in Paradise, near the Calm Belt. It’s very cut off from other places, so most people don’t even read the newspaper there, and she must still be there if I have to go home to visit her,” Apis responded. The man’s pleading eyes met Marco’s analytic stare while the latter mulled over his options.

He could very easily ignore the other man’s concerns and tell him that someone was playing a trick, if a very sick one. However, there were some things about that conclusion that refused to sit right in Marco’s gut. What if something else was going on that he was missing?

Maybe... 

“Okay then-yoi, we leave in the morning,” Marco finally agreed. Apis cheered and thanked him many times before running from the room to tell his crewmates the good news. Marco heard the familiar sound of a chorus of shouts coming from further up the hall and shook his head.

Knowing that he would have to plan for the trip and inform Pops of their absence beforehand, he failed to bite back the sigh that passed his lips as he packed away his maps. So much for some time to relax.

He leant back on his desk chair with another defeated sigh. His attention was brought back to the letter that rested on the desk in front of him. Marco considered its contents further and found more questions than answers. Some small part of him hoped that the letter could be taken at face value, no matter how sad that would be for his crewman, and that he could use the time in Paradise to unwind. The smile that made a home on his face seemed to enjoy that idea as well.

If only the ‘normalcy’ of the ocean had agreed to that as well...  
\---

A week into their journey it became clear that the ocean itself seemed to want to slow their progress. The already unpredictable and turbulent weather of the New World had been throwing everything it had at them, disappointed that they came out the other side of each encounter still on their way to the other side of the Grand Line.

While this meant that they were alive, the hindrances to the trip had slowly been taking their toll on the crew’s morale. Marco understood that his men had signed up for this journey to help one of their own and have a good story to return to the Moby with, but the lack of good news made them act less like sea-hardened warriors and more akin to a class of children who had just been told that their next day trip was cancelled - sulky and regretful.

Speaking of being regretful, Marco grimaced at the atmosphere in the dining room during that evening’s meal. The cooks had also caught the feeling of melancholy spreading through the crew and had taken to producing meals with the minimum amount of effort required. The singular sigh that echoed throughout the dining room was the final straw for Marco to throw in the towel and rethink his plans for the trip, so long easy trip and hello going out of his way to make his men happy.

After finishing his meal, Marco stood on the table in front of him, which garnered the attention of his crew in the process. “There’s been a change of plans-yoi, I’ll be setting off tomorrow by myself on a scouting trip. You’ll be following me on the same course that I set at the start of this trip, no deviating to go on an unscheduled adventure.” A chorus of ‘boo’s followed that command. “There will be no exceptions, especially with the daily report I expect through the Den Den Mushi. If anyone disagrees with this plan, say something now-yoi.”

A lone voice came from the crowd, “But, Commander, what if something happens to you?”

“Then you’ll all be the first people to know.”

\---

The next day, at the break of dawn Marco signalled his departure to the crewmen ending their scheduled night watch as he took to the sky. A loud ‘goodbye’ trailed behind him in the wind which he answered with a louder call.

The sight of the ocean spread out in front of him while the sea breezes were swept underneath his wings made something sing in Marco’s chest. It was a warm, burning fire that made its home beneath his heart and called out to the horizon at a volume that drowned out all of his many worries.

Perhaps this trip would be his chance to make time for himself. 

That thought fueled the next beat of his wings as he climbed higher and higher. He continued to rise past the clouds until he broke through to a landscape of sun kissed white and glowing blue. Marco steadied himself to glide along the waves of the vaporous ocean, allowing the tips of his wings to dip into the gentle water, and took a lungful of clean air. The cry that he let out could be heard for miles around.

It was enough to release all of the sour expectations that Marco held for the trip ahead of him. The adventure, if such a journey could be called that, was going to be between the sea and sky with Marco freely flying in between. 

And he would have it no other way.

\---

“Welcome!”

“Hello there, Stranger!”

“Lovely morning, isn’t it?”

The moment that Marco had stepped into Apis’ hometown he had been warmly greeted by every person that passed him. Their friendly waves and tones that dripped with false familiarity sent an unwelcome shiver dancing across his spine.

As a precaution, he had hid his mark underneath his shirt but that never stopped people from recognising his face - even in the smaller villages they sometimes passed through. The island truly was cut off from the rest of the world. Their welcoming of strangers could easily be attributed to not getting many travellers docking on their shores, but the cold in his lower back refused to dissipate.

He, however, was here for a reason. To put focus back onto his goal, Marco approached the closest street vendor under the guise of browsing his wares to inquire, “Nice village, real quaint. You get many sailors through here?”

“Oh ho, not that many,” the old street vendor chuckled. He thoughtfully stroked his moustache, “Just the regular traders that work for Mr Udin.”

“Mr Udin? What’s he like-yoi?” Marco asked in a mockery of honest curiosity.

“Very charming young man. Has charmed half the women in the village, including the married ones, and some of the men. Been the talk of the town since he hit shore a couple months back with his fleet of traders. Promised he’d bring business to the island but not much has changed besides his lackeys visiting every so often,” the vendor explained. “Except that fire last month.”

“Fire?”

“Oh yes, terrible thing that was. Half of Second Street up in flames before they could put it out. Nobody got hurt, mind you but plenty of families without homes because of it,” the vendor answered with a solemn nod. He perked up a moment later, “Then Mr Udin comes along and offers them a place to stay while they get their homes fixed up. Tried not to make a big deal about it, the good fellow, but you know how it is in small towns, word travels fast.”

Marco had to raise an eyebrow at the timing of that particular string of events. The cold feeling grew worse when he asked, “One of those families wouldn’t happen to be a woman named Violet and her daughter, would it?”

The old man thought for a moment then answered with a smile, “Yes, actually. Lovely woman, little Tot is a bit of a talker but that isn’t much to an old timer like me. You know her?”

Marco internally grimaced at his response. His gut twisted at the conclusion that something more was going on than he first thought. Keeping visible neutrality, he answered, “She’s an old friend of mine-yoi. I’ve been away at sea for a long time and thought I’d stop by, like old times.”

“A sailor, eh? You look the type. I’m sure she’ll be glad to see you, after everything that has happened,” he commented.

“So, where does this Mr Udin live?” Marco asked while looking around the quiet street.

“On top of the hill, in the big house with lots of windows,” the old man answered while pointing past the village houses to a small mansion near the highest point on the island. Marco followed his gesture to reach the building in question and found himself less than impressed by the purposeful symbolism of placing one's house above everyone around them to make a person feel superior. He knew the type of man Mr Udin must be. The cold feeling in his spine mirrored his displeasure at the sight of the gaudy house and the understanding that he would have to go into it one way or another.

He thanked the old vendor, purchasing food for the road that went into his backpack, before making his way down the street. The leisurely pace of his steps contrasted with the tight knot in his stomach and the thoughts racing through his head. His mind immediately jumped to several conclusions, none of which were particularly positive, but he ignored them when he reached the curve in the street.

Marco took in the scenery from the top of the hill. The entire island was visible except for an area beyond a confined section of dense looking woodland. He wondered if the people on the island ever felt as if they were being watched.

Turning on his heel, Marco looked up at Mr Udin’s house. It was worse up close. The pristine white paint and golden accents clashed with the homely aesthetic of the village and could easily be mistaken for an eyesore. The large windows cut into its walls meant that keeping the house heated was an expensive endeavor, signs that the owner was clearly overcompensating in flaunting his wealth.

Mr Udin was a big fish in a small pond.

Marco filed that away for later as he knocked on the front door, the sound echoing from inside the building. A few moments later a young brunette girl in a pale brown dress and apron opened the door a crack and asked, “This is Mr Udin’s residence, are you here to visit the master of the house?”

He took in the girl’s appearance, she was too young to be working in an estate, while he answered, “No, I’m here to see Violet. I was told that she’s staying here right now.”

“You’re here to see Mama? Do you know Papa?” The little girl’s eyes lit up as she spoke. The door was left to swing open, she stepped forward to pull on his sash, “Where is he? Is he hiding?”

Marco smiled. He crouched closer to her height and mirthfully answered, “Sorry to disappoint but it’s only me for now. I do know your Papa, and he’s on his way here to visit.”

“Really?” She said in an awe filled whisper, “Does that mean you’re a pirate too?”

“That’ll be our secret-yoi,” he whispered back with a smirk. The girl giggled.

“And who’s this? Someone from the village wishing to thank me for my great generosity in moving here?” Another voice joined their conversation. The sound made the girl flinch away from him to bow at the new person in the doorway. Marco stood up to face the man that had come to make himself known.

His brow creased at the spindly man in front of him. The smug and expectant grin on the man’s face made Marco want to punch him, but he held himself back. His well-made black suit and slicked back hair made it so that Marco was inclined to believe that this man was Mr Udin, but he couldn’t be sure.

“Are you mute? Speak you poor soul,” the man commanded.

Marco’s eyes narrowed and he harshly replied, “And who are you-yoi? Mr Udin?”

The man let out an understanding sound before he went on, “Why yes, you may call me Sir Udin if you wish. Now tell me, my simplistic friend, why have you come here? Are you perhaps looking for a job on my illustrious staff?”

He laughed under his breath then chuckled, “I’m here to visit a woman named Violet. I was told she was staying here.” Marco then caught the little girl’s eye while mimicking, “Or is she part of your illustrious staff too?”

“Violet? Violet?” Mr Udin rolled the name on his tongue a few more times before he laughed, “Oh her! A rather easily impressed woman, very standard for a place like this. She’s working as a cook in my kitchen.”

Isn’t she supposed to be staying here as a guest?

The question rested on the tip of Marco’s tongue. Although the time to ask it was swept away by Mr Udin’s demanding order, “Tot, show him to the kitchen. Make sure he doesn’t wander off now, this place is large enough to get lost in.” The last part said with an accusatory lilt and glare that Marco returned in kind.

“Yes, Master Udin,” Tot bowed before pulling Marco inside by his sash. The man followed without complaint, not outwardly reacting when he caught Mr Udin giving him a onceover out of the corner of his eye. The click of a heavy lock trailed after them, but Marco didn’t think much of it - rich people could be extremely paranoid about their possessions.

As soon as they exited Mr Udin’s range of hearing, Tot began to talk his ear off with questions about all of the adventures that her father must have had at sea. Marco gave her short replies when she paused to take a breath; yet, he found his attention brought to the hallways around them. The walls were extravagantly decorated with similar pristine white paint and gold accents to the ones adorning the outside of the house. The furnishings could be described as being at the same level of flashy as the walls, being made from varnished dark wood and glossy fabrics.

The nice interior decorating, however, ended at the kitchen. Tot skipped down the stairwell at the entrance of the room and leapt at a woman washing dishes at the sink. The woman laughed, turning to crouch and hug the girl in response, while Marco made his own way down the stairs. Rushed words were exchanged, that he failed to catch, before the woman kissed Tot on the forehead.

They separated, Tot went to continue the dishes in the woman’s stead, and the woman stood from her place to greet him, “I’m sorry for the wait, Tot has been very affectionate recently and you know how kids are.” She bowed, “It’s wonderful to meet a friend of my husband’s. I’d give you my name, but you already know it, so I’m more inclined to ask for yours.”

“It’s Marco-yoi,” he answered with a smile.

Violet made a surprised sound, her eyes lighting up in recognition, one which she quickly tried to hide behind her hand, “You’re quite famous, you know. And here I am looking a mess.” She joked, but nevertheless dusted her dress off. Not that her hands could wipe away the evident work stains on her uniform, a set that matched that of her daughter’s. “My husband said that he’d join a powerful crew someday, but I never expected anything like this. How is he? Did something happen? Is that why you’re here?” Her welcoming expression dropped as she spoke, her hand moved to grip the front of her dress, and she looked up at him with wide, glassy eyes.

Marco placed a steadying hand on her shoulder while he explained, “I was hoping that you could answer that question for me. He received a letter a week ago, from you, saying that you wanted a divorce. We all set out for this island so he could try and ‘win you back’, but I flew ahead to report back on the situation.”

“What? Divorce?” Violet gasped. She shook her head furiously, tears welling up in her eyes, “I never sent that letter, I would rather die than betray my husband like that. You have to believe me.”

Marco moved the bag from his shoulder to reach inside and pull out the letter. He unfolded it before handing it to her while he tried to console, “From everything Apis has told me over the years, I do trust your words. But that doesn’t explain how this letter got onto our ship. Do you have any idea who would send this and why?”

Violet took the paper with shaky hands then tearily answered, “I have no clue, I never thought I’d have enemies. Oh dear.” Her grip on the page got stronger, “Who would do something like this?”

“‘Who’ indeed!” A familiar voice merrily chimed in.

Everyone in the room turned to see Mr Udin standing at the top of the kitchen stairwell. His already smug expression was stretched into a large grin as he surveyed them from afar. Something about his eyes set Marco on edge, enough for him to place himself between the other man and his crewman’s family. 

He watched with narrowed eyes while Mr Udin made his way down the stairs before coming to a stop a few feet in front of him. Mr Udin chuckled, “Seems that your little mystery has brought you here quicker than I expected. That doesn’t matter though, my men can work on a tighter schedule.”

“What are you talking about?” Marco growled.

His question went unanswered as Mr Udin sighed, “It’s a shame. I was getting used to having staff on my estate again, no matter how unqualified they were.” He placed his hand under his chin in a thoughtful way, or rather a mockery of one, “I’ll just have to use the money I get from them to buy new ones.”

Realisation flashed through Marco’s mind, making the man go completely still. Then his blood grew hot in his veins as he yelled, “You motherfucker!”

“How vulgar,” Mr Udin chuckled. “I expected better from a highly wanted pirate, an extremely valuable one at that, but perhaps I got my hopes up. Isn’t that right, Marco the Phoenix?”

“Don’t even say my name, you slave trading piece of shit,” Marco spat feeling the blue flames of his zoan dance along his fingertips. He turned to take the letter from Violet’s hold, dropping his bag in the process, before thrusting it towards the other man, “I’m guessing this is your handiwork. Pretty low to use a sailor’s family against them while they’re away. Why? Want to make a statement against my crew by selling Apis’ family? Is that it?” 

Marco knew that he should keep his voice down, who knew if the scumbag had backup, but this wouldn’t be the first time someone had taken advantage of a pirate leaving their family while at sea. The fact that Udin also planned to sell another human being, treating them as property, made his blood run even hotter than before.

“Oh please, Apis was just a means to an end, just like his wife and child,” Udin tittered. He took a step forward, which Marco mirrored by taking one of his own closer to the woman behind him, “I’ve got my eyes on a much bigger payday. After all, collectors are willing to pay a lot more than regular owners. But with your Devil Fruit, you would know that already.”

“This was about me then,” Marco accused. He let the transformation take his arms, “You went to all this trouble just to catch me. What makes you think that I’d go down so easily?”

“Because, by the end of this you’ll be no better than any other stupid animal,” Udin answered before lunging.

Marco was quick enough to pull Violet with him as he dodged to the side. He left her alone to jump over another swing; an action which he followed up with a swift kick to the back of Udin’s head. He twisted in the air to land without his back facing his opponent. The shot that rang out the moment he turned was followed by a ripping sensation in his leg. Marco raised an eyebrow at the still smoking gun in Udin’s shaky grip.

He smirked and began to step forward on the injured limb, but quickly regretted his decision when his leg failed to support him. Quickly catching himself, Marco hissed through his teeth, “Fucking seastone bullets.”

“Exactly! I knew I couldn’t win in an actual fight against a member of Whitebeard’s crew, let alone his top commander, so I had some of these shipped over from the New World.” Udin cooed as he threw aside his gun. 

He stepped towards Marco until he could reach out and touch him. Marco tried to roll to the side but felt the seastone draining his energy as Udin gripped his hair. He bared his teeth; to which the other man chuckled, “Just stay still you dumb bird, wouldn’t want to damage the merchandise.”

“Get fucked,” Marco hissed and spat in his face.

“How mature,” Udin muttered before grabbing Marco by the throat.

Marco willed his wings to transform, yet his flames slid further over his body. Never had he ever considered the day that he would be afraid of his own zoan form, but with the transformation forcefully taking hold while the air was being stolen from his lungs Marco felt as if his fire was burning him. Eventually, the grip on his neck was loosened and the body of his phoenix form was dropped to the ground.

Udin loomed over him and laughed, “Marco the Phoenix, finally under my foot.” He lifted his leg to make good on his joke. Then a small figure threw themself into his side.

Marco didn’t register the series of events that followed with a woman from the kitchen lifting him onto her back while the rest of the kitchen staff threatened Udin. She ran down the halls of the mansion while explaining, “I’m sorry to ask this Mr Marco, but would you mind saving the village?”

He made a coo-ing sound in response and the woman laughed.

“Mr Udin burnt down our houses and started charging us high rent in his mansion. Anyone that complained, he sold. He has a weird power that steals a person’s strength, so none of us can fight him now. You have a whole crew, right? Could you come back for us with them?”

Marco tried to push himself out of her grasp, he could still fight.

“No, please. You’re already shot and he wants you as a bird. We’ll be fine until you come back, so please! You’re the only hope we have,” she begged and Marco stilled. The pair stopped in front of a window. The woman grinned before throwing it open. She maneuvered so that Marco could slide onto the windowsill, “Violet talks about her husband a lot. No one believed her when she said that he was part of a strong crew. Wish we had, we could have asked sooner.”

Marco nodded and glanced down the hall towards the kitchen, where he heard the clear sounds of a struggle.

“Please, come back for us,” she asked once more while nudging him away. She didn’t wait for a response before running back down the hallway.

He hesitated, the wound on his leg throbbing worse than in his human form. The moonlight shone through the window around him, the silhouette of his current form creating an icy chill in his stomach.

Marco took flight. He didn’t slow down until the island was a dot on the horizon, a lonely shadow against the inky blackness of the night sky.

The cool sea breeze beat against his wings and he shivered. He never realised how warm his phoenix form kept him at full power. Speaking of being at full power, the adrenaline off his fight had worn off and the bullet wound on his leg was starting to hinder his flight. Fatigue was also setting in. Marco glanced around to find something to help him...

A small, uninhabited island.

That would do for the night. Marco began to move into a gentle dive when the seastone bullet shifted and he felt drained all over again. The wind whistled past him, but he failed to register it as his eyes slipped close; whatever happened next was unknown to him while his consciousness trickled away.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> That was just a little bit of an introduction to the story. I hope people liked it.  
> Usopp will be the star of next chapter, so my fellow stans will have to wait for that.
> 
> Please comment and tell me what you think!  
> Also follow me on Twitter @Fanfic_On_Main to keep up with story progress and other things.  
> Until next time, bye bye!


	2. Wishes of the Little Liar

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Usopp's life is consumed by memory of his mother, and the shadow of the father he's never met.
> 
> So, he decides to make a new life. A new beginning at sea.
> 
> Too bad he's powerless against the whims of ocean itself.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey everyone!  
> Thanks for the comments asking me to continue this fic. They really help motivate and inspire me to do better.  
> I hope this chapter lives up to everyone's expectations.  
> Best boi Usopp is the main focus this time so here we go!

Another morning, another day of Syrup Village being greeted by the sounds of a liar’s yelling.

Yet, by the time the sun was high in the sky and the town was bustling in the warm spring sunshine he still had not appeared. His small running steps had not been heard throughout the morning hours and while some thought this to be a blessing, others took as a sign to be concerned.

‘Should we check on him?’

‘What if he’s sick?’

‘Who saw him last?’

Many more questions were passed around the village during the early afternoon. People stood in the street outside their homes looking towards the boy’s house. They continued to wonder while none made an actual step towards the source of their thoughts, as if they were too afraid to break the fragile quiet of their newfound peace.

Although, the object of their musings was not within his place of residence. If anyone had been awake during the late night hours while the moon lit up the world, they would have seen the shadow of a young liar on his way to a secret place of his own. They might have witnessed the young boy drag everything precious to him, treasures collected during his few years on the island, along with him to the beach. For that was where he was going to cast off to a new life.

\---

Usopp hummed to himself as he re-checked the last rope on his log vessel. The song was one his mother had sang before her death a year prior. It was a sweet but lonely tune that had always made him thoughtful.

How could something be so bittersweet?

Then he had learned the answer at his mother’s grave. Every memory of their life together had, seemingly, flashed in front of him while several men helped him create a resting place for his remaining parent - the one that stayed, the other person left behind. It had been raining that day, he remembered that much, but everything else was a tear stained blur that Usopp never felt like repairing. Thinking back to everything before that day was as if he was wading through a field of marshmallow fluff and thorns.

Sometimes, on nights where sleep had already managed to avoid him until the very early moments of the day, that field would turn into a grasping ocean waiting to pull him under. Yet, he never drowned in those syrupy waters; he simply sank further into the all-encompassing darkness until the waking world called him back.

The rest of his life had fallen into a frail monotony; his days began with the loud lies of pirates and ended in his comfortless house. A distinction being made in his own head between the place where he rested and his home - a place which he felt was no longer in the village without his mother. 

So, just like his father, Usopp let the ocean call to him. He listened as the curves and dips of the blue-green waves whispered saccharine promises of a life filled with adventure. Adventures that would wash away the sticky feeling that coated his heart and choked his soul.

Usopp ended his song with one last tug at the ropes of his small sail. This was it. The beginning of a life at sea. He had been waiting for this day for a long time, a dream started by the fabrications of his father’s return that he made ring out in the village every morning until his voice was hoarse.

The log raft in front of him sat on the edge of the shore, the water gently lapping at the rope fastened wood, as he announced, “Time to set sail!” Usopp laughed while he pushed the boat through the sand until it entered the water. It bobbed happily in the shallow waves of the cove.

A boat worthy of the sea.

Usopp smiled proudly at his little vessel. It took him more effort than before to row it outside of the waves pulling it back towards the island, towards the only place he had ever known, but when it finally began to drift further out to sea Usopp cried out from the back of it, “So long! Next time I come back here I’ll be a famous adventurer, I just know it.”

Deep down, he knew that his words would simply be carried off by the wind - never heard by ears other than his own - but the announcement of his childish dream brought a feeling of hope to Usopp’s heart. The sea was where silly dreams came true and anything could happen if one went looking for adventure, that’s what his mother had always told him and he never thought she was a liar (not like him).

He would sail the five oceans, discover great treasure and find his dad in the process.

The last part of his dream always made something hurt in the back of his head and his gut twist slightly. The sensations never made sense to him. His dad was the most amazing person in the world - another thing his mother had insisted on telling him every chance she could - he was a sniper on a famous pirate crew that Usopp kept forgetting the name of. Maybe he could ask around other villages along the way. 

Although, Usopp had to do something amazing too before he could meet the man, otherwise he wouldn’t be able to make him proud. His mother had said that he would be proud of him no matter what, but he wasn’t so sure of that himself - he hadn’t done much with his life yet after all.

He had to become a brave warrior of the sea before he met his dad, that much Usopp was sure about.

\---

A map.

Usopp needed a map and fast.

A week at sea had been enough time for him to realise that. His food was running low and what little money he had in his pocket was useless without a single island on the horizon.

He resigned himself to floating aimlessly until land came, there was no use in rowing when he had no set direction in mind. The waves splashed droplets onto the deck of the boat as they dragged it along for hours on end. Usopp felt no reason to busy his hands so he laid down on the wood and let the sea spray wash over him as well.

So much for adventure.

Usopp sullenly contemplated what he was going to do if no island came. There was no way that he could make food and water appear out of thin air. The thought made him laugh a little. On the sea, anything could happen but that definitely wouldn’t. He was never going to be that lucky. He was just plain old Usopp…

And he was going to die at sea.

That was another thing that made him laugh. Months of planning, building and wishing for his own grand voyage and he wasn’t even going to make it to see another island. He was going to solely exist within the minds of a small community in the East Blue - made up of people that probably didn’t care that he was gone. No one would even be around to tell him goodbye, nor he to any other person.

He was so wrapped up in his own wallowing that he failed to notice the quickly gathering storm clouds until the first crash of thunder. It sounded as if the sky had shattered above his head, enough to make Usopp flinch into a sitting position where he uselessly covered his head. The yell he let out was answered by another boom and a flash of lightning. Chilling rain quickly followed, droplets hitting him at an intensity greater than any spring shower in Syrup Village.

He uncurled from his defensive position to frantically glance about his boat. His bag and oar were quickly sliding towards the progressively more turbulent water so he sent himself skidding after them, throwing his front along the splintering, waterlogged surface of the wood. They were both caught right before their unscheduled plunge into the darkened waters that proceeded to throw the boat into the air.

Usopp clung to his possessions for dear life and prayed that the sea would be merciful. His back hit the raft a moment later, knocking the air from his lungs in a single gasped yelp. The storm left him no time to re-adjust as a streak of lightning shot out overhead while the rain grew heavier still. He looked out across the battling ocean, finding the storm stretching out in every direction, before resigning himself to the understanding that he lacked the strength to push past this particular force of nature.

Death at sea was looking more likely now than ever before.

However, the storm wasn’t going to be the thing that killed him. Usopp reassured himself of as much. His mother would be disappointed in him for dying before meeting his father, like she had expressed wanting in her last moments. He had to survive to meet him. It was the only thing that mattered to him anymore.

Steeling what small part of his will that still existed, Usopp pulled a spare rope from his bag and dragged himself towards the boat’s mast. The sail had already been ripped off by the relentless wind, leaving the wooden pole to simply creak under the strain of keeping itself upright. He placed the oar and bag between his body and the mast before tying the rope around all of it.

After pulling it tight enough that the material of his clothes dug into his sides, Usopp used his limbs to hug the mast. His eyes were forced closed as the rain escalated once more, the raindrops stinging his eyes when they landed in them, and strained to remain in the same position while the boat was thrown into the air again.

He stayed like that for what felt like days. His only thoughts for the entire time were a frantic mantra about the importance of his survival; however, never once did he question why he placed the value of his own life solely on the happiness of a man he had never met, rather than his own.

\---

Usopp awoke to the sound of sea birds crying in the distance. The noise was accompanied by that of water gently meeting the shore of an island. He rubbed the sleep from his eyes, an action which his entire body protested against with a singular, persistent ache in his everywhere. It felt as if he had been slapped over every part of his skin at once and survived the encounter with the bruise as evidence. Then again...

Wait, an island?

He stopped his bodily inspection to take in the scenery. The raft rested on the bank of an almost completely empty, save for a few fruit trees, grass-covered island. Around the small landmass lay miles of still waters. Usopp’s newly awoken brain decided to question how the ocean could look like it wasn’t moving at all; was it frozen or something?

Not finding answers in a few long minutes of staring into the distance, Usopp untied himself from the mast. His back immediately hit the logs underneath him without anything to support his worn form. The contact made him wince and he sat up to rub at the newly abused flesh. His abrupt movement made the oar fall onto the ground beside him while his bag stayed securely in his lap. He sighed in relief at the sight of both objects, they were all he had.

Staying on the ground wasn’t getting him anywhere so Usopp stood up and slung his still damp bag over his shoulder before stepping off the raft. The feeling of the sand shifting beneath the soles of his shoes sent a pang of relief through his heart. Land, solid ground, something underfoot that wasn’t shifting at the whims of the ocean, Usopp never thought he would miss it after only a week at sea. Yet, with every step he took further from the shore, he found himself feeling more at ease.

The change from sand to grass prompted Usopp to sit down once more, looking back out over the unmoving sea, and drop his bag onto his lap. It was a fairly large bag; it was packed with every single item Usopp had thought necessary for his trip, ranging from a medical kit to his favourite slingshot. He rifled around inside until his hand made contact with a flat object wrapped in plastic.

“Yes, it’s still here,” he cheered while pulling it from the dark confines of his bag. The plastic packet was followed by a trickle of water that made him groan, he didn’t even want to know the state of his clothing. Instead of focusing on the negative, however, Usopp inspected the plastic in his grasp to find the contents completely dry. He almost cried in relief at the sight of his sketchbook being safe after his entire ordeal.

It had once been his mother’s, while she still had the strength to draw, but she had given it to him. She meant to teach him how to draw before her death; however, fate had a different idea as her body deteriorated quicker than the village doctor had expected. The remaining pages had been left empty as a result, Usopp didn’t think it was his place to use it without her being there beside him.

He carefully placed it down on the grass before methodically emptying the rest of his supplies. As he had expected, all of the fabric objects like his clothes and the spare sail were soaked through while others were simply wet; this included his food which meant that his bread was ruined and a lot of other things had to be washed in clean water. Speaking of clean water, Usopp shook his canteen to find it almost empty. He would have to fix that problem as soon as possible.

Despite the less than optimal circumstances, Usopp observed the island around him. It would act as his base for a couple of days while his sail dried, but he could make the most of it anyway.

Taking that mindset with him, he gathered the still edible food back into his bag while setting out the rest for the sea birds he had heard overhead beforehand. The next task on his list was climbing the fruit tree for its fruit and branches, both fell to the ground with him after he lost his footing. The resounding crash felt as if it echoed, but it also sounded like it came from further away at the same time. Maybe he had injured his head during the storm?

Camp was set up not long after he picked himself off the ground. A tent against the tree, a small fire and some fruit for an evening meal. His wet clothes were also set aside to dry between another set of the trees. Everything was coming together; Usopp was proud of himself. He admitted as much aloud before settling in for the evening, a sentiment echoed by the sun slowly slipping down the sky towards the edge of the ocean.

Usopp sat beneath the tarp of his tent, in front of his small crackling fire, to watch the last glimpses of daylight. The brief moment of twilight that followed made the sea sparkle in a gradient of pinks, purples and blues. Seeing the still surface of the ocean act as a perfect mirror for the sky miles over his head made Usopp consider the duality of the ocean itself. One moment it acted as if it were set on dragging him beneath its depths never to be seen again, much like the ocean in his dreams, while in others, like the one in front of him that very night, it showed a tender side that made him want to never leave his newfound life at sea.

Yet, a small part of him wondered if he would ever have someone to share moments like this with. Sailors, pirates, heck even the marines, had crews that shared in the ups and downs on the five seas. They were comrades in arms, friends until the end, families in everything besides blood; nothing at sea mattered more than the trust between people of the high seas. Or rather, that was his mother had always told him when she told him stories of his dad. All of the adventures he had ever been on had been beside the men he considered to be his ‘second family’.

All of this while Usopp had no one - on dry land or on his little raft.

The chill of the night breeze cut deeper than before as Usopp huddled into himself, hugging his knees to his chest. The constant negative inclination of his own mind was something he had grown used to over the years. After all, how was he supposed to regard his existence in the shadow of his dad cast by the light of the only adult that had found his personality to be quirky and endearing, instead of annoying and ‘a bad influence for someone so young’. He didn’t hate his dad though, far from it; he understood that his faults were his own failings, because he wasn’t brave and stronger like he wanted to be.

How was he supposed to become a warrior of the sea if he couldn’t even sail a ship to another island by himself? Usopp asked this underneath his breath as he laid down and watched the night sky pass by. If this were one of his stories the twinkling of the stars would be a code that gave him the answer to his question; but, Usopp squinted at the dazzling pinpricks that flashed sporadically above him and found nothing of the sort, it just made his eyes hurt a little bit.

Then again, he had read in a book once that the stars were supposed to be able to grant wishes if they were falling. He found a kind of grim irony in pinning one’s hopes on the dazzling final moments of a celestial body. People could be so weird. Then something in the distance caught his eye.

A streak of blue-ish light shot across the sky, its movement reflected in the waters below. Its shimmering tail created a fading arc along its path. It was beautiful. Usopp’s eyes welled up at the sight of it, maybe the sea was on his side. Burying any previous skepticism, he brought his hands together in a praying gesture and sternly whispered, “I don’t know if this will work, but if it does…” He closed his eyes and concentrated from the bottom of his heart, “Please help me become stronger.” 

He lifted his head to be able to watch the shooting star fizzle out. However, when Usopp caught sight of it again it seemed closer than it had been a moment ago. 

Was it getting bigger?

The sound of something akin to a bird’s cry reached his ears as the star took a nosedive. It was heading straight for him! Usopp screamed at the top of his lungs and dived behind the nearest fruit tree. The star hit the island with a crash, scarily close to where he had been stargazing a moment ago. It skidded, digging into the soft earth in its path, a few meters before coming to stop at the end of its path of destruction.

Usopp didn’t hide the shivering that had taken over his entire body while he peeked out from behind the fruit tree. The area around the fallen star glowed in a mix of blue and yellow hues. He noticed the tips of a fire flickering above the crest of dirt shielding the rest of the star from his view; yet, when he trailed his eyes across the path it had created there was no fire to speak of. 

Curiosity being at the forefront of his mind, Usopp crawled over to the mound of dirt on his knees. The gulp that he used to swallow the built up saliva in his mouth scratched against his suddenly dry throat. What if the star was toxic or something? He had never seen a star up close and didn’t know that much about them to begin with; could you get sick from touching something from space? What if he never got to leave the island because he was too ill to sail again?

The blue flames flickered once more in front of his eyes, as if to snap Usopp out of his spiral. Whether or not it was intentional, they got his attention and made the remaining questions from his moment of panic evaporate into nothing. He could do this. It was only the first step in his life of grand adventures. Instilling courage into his quivering heart, he peeked over the top of the dirt to find the fiery body of something that definitely wasn’t a star.

It could still be from space since Usopp was sure that birds weren’t supposed to be bright blue and on fire while still breathing. Then again, birds didn’t usually like being on fire. He hurried over to his camp to grab his canteen before returning to throw the contents over the flaming animal. The liquid ran slowly along the surface of the flames for a moment, as if uncertain about where they were, before disappearing into them.

What?

He rubbed at his eyes. Then looked between his now empty canteen and the bird in front of him. Usopp was sure he hadn’t imagined that.

Maybe it wasn’t enough water?

He got up to get some from the sea but found himself falling instead as his footing slipped on the uneven dirt. Usopp braced himself for the inevitable pain of hitting the ground or being set on fire but neither thing ever came. 

The sky was the only thing in his unmoving field of vision now so that meant he had landed on his back; more specifically he was on his back on top of something soft and periodically moving. The surface beneath his tremor filled hands was almost fluid as he ran them across it. The way it shifted around his splayed out fingers reminded him of blades of grass, if they were somehow a single object. It was also very warm, like a blanket after being left by the fireplace during winter.

Usopp pulled himself into a seated position to get a better look at his landing spot. It was the bird’s torso. He was sitting on the space bird. His butt was in contact with the flaming bird that had fallen from the sky into a dirty crater. And, yet, he was perfectly fine.

The bird let out a groan before trying to roll over. Usopp floundered for a moment until it resettled and called out, “Wait a minute! Don’t move while I’m on top of you, or I’ll fall.” When the movement stopped, he steadied himself by placing his hands at his sides; only to grimace when one of them landed in something sticky and wet.

He brought his hand in front of his face to find a tacky, red liquid staining his skin. Usopp’s face paled. It was blood. He shifted to see the same substance smeared across the leg of the bird. The panicked yell that left his mouth did nothing to stir the bird but that didn’t stop him from asking, “Did I do that?! Oh god, I meet a mysterious creature and immediately kill it. Wait no, it’s not dead, it’s breathing!”

As if by fate, the bird’s breathing stuttered for a beat - in the same way that someone might snore - and Usopp went into a frenzy. He slid off the bird’s torso to rush back to his tent while pleading, “Please stay alive! I have something to help, just wait a minute.” He threw out everything in the way of his goal, the first aid kit, which he then rushed over. He didn’t register the torn skin on his knees as he skidded to a stop next to the bird’s prone form. 

Usopp pulled out the biggest bandage he had to wrap around the wound, tight enough for him to be certain it would help stop the bleeding. His quivering hands matched his voice as he tied the end of the bandage into a small bow, a habit picked up from his mother, “Please don’t die. I know you’re not a star but I wished on you, so that means other people have done the same thing, right? You’re a wishing bird. That means you can’t die if I hope enough! That’s how this should work!” The last few words were yelled in a desperate attempt to gain a reaction from the still unconscious bird.

Yet nothing came of it.

Usopp never even felt the tears that started to trail down his cheeks until the sobs that accompanied them made his breathing hitch. He sniffled into the bird’s side, “I can’t watch someone else die in front of me, so please just live a little while longer.”

He cried at the bird’s side for what felt like hours. Eventually, he ran out of tears to shed but that didn’t stop the stutter of his pleas and the grip of his hands on the flame-like feathers that decorated the bird’s skin. Only the former trickled to a stop when exhaustion finally caught up with his still worn body while his vice-like hold persisted well into the late hours of the night.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I hope you enjoyed ready this chapter.  
> Please comment your thoughts, I love hearing from people.  
> Until next time then! Have fun!


	3. A Tale for Tori-san

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Just wanted to say thank to the people who have already posted comments on this - I enjoy hearing from you all.
> 
> This is the first chapter where our two main characters will actually interact so I hope you all like it!

The gentle rocking of the ship and the muffled sound of ocean waves, as they crashed into each other and the sides of the boat, were the things that sent sailors into the land of dreams and greeted them every morning. It was a comforting constant at sea, like the cradle of a loving mother humming a lullaby. How true those words were, the sea, while cruel at times, was a fair and doting parent to all of those that gave it the respect it deserved. The respect it had earned through its fearsome strength and unyielding will.

Marco, however, did not wake to any of those feelings. The ground underneath him was static. It was also kind of cold, so it definitely wasn’t his bed, and damp, actually it might be his bed but if that was the case someone was going to die. Then something warm shifted against his side.

His eyes shot open. The view that greeted him was that of the morning sky, awash with a pastel coloured gradient of warm hues, behind a small mountain of recently disturbed dirt. Marco shifted his head to take in more of his surroundings; he was on an island, most likely the one he had crash landed onto the night before. The mirror-like surface of the ocean troubled him, but he had other things to think about in that moment.

His gaze turned towards himself. The roughed up state of his body was something he hadn’t seen since the first few months of gaining his Devil Fruit, back when his powers were still very new to him, and the dirt that clung to it made him look all the more battered. He needed a bath. A growl from his stomach also surprised him, hunger didn’t bother him much since getting his Devil Fruit too. Eating food was another thing to add to the checklist.

Then he spotted the small bundle cosying itself up to his side. Marco initially thought it was a weird bush, the tangled black top visible over his feathers, but when it moved to sprawl out onto the ground he saw what it actually was. A sleeping child. A boy with an abnormally long nose had a death grip on some of the feathers on his side while quietly snoring towards the sky.

Where the hell had he come from?

Marco figured that the island was deserted, given how there were no actual buildings on the island. The haphazard tent against one of the nearby fruit trees couldn’t be permanent, so the child must have been at sea at some point. Then he noticed the crudely made log raft washed up on the shore on the other side of the small island. It was barely holding together and honestly looked kind of sad. Maybe it could be fixed using some new logs from the fruit trees.

He went to pick himself up from the ground but stopped when pain lanced through his leg. The yell, really more of a squawk in his Zoan form, he made in reaction startled the child awake. He yanked at his feathers while bolting upright and yelping, “We’re under attack!”

The loud exclamation startled Marco enough to clip the boy on the back of the head with his wing; the pain that action caused was unexpected. He brought the wing on the opposite side of his injured leg closer to eye level to find a section of it bent out of place - it would have to be bent back and set. Thankfully, the boy had stopped screaming to clutch at his head and complain about it hurting a lot.

Wonderful news all around.

The boy then took notice of the fact that his companion was very much awake now, which prompted more yelling. “You’re alive! Or maybe you aren’t. If so, please don’t hurt me ghost bird, I tried everything I could to save you. I’m allergic to ghosts you see and I’ll start sneezing on you if you attack me…”

What was happening?

Marco just watched in confusion as the child in front of him ranted about how his allergy to ghosts was contagious and Marco would sneeze at himself if he touched him. The boy didn’t stop until the need for air became apparent. Before he could continue after that, however, Marco made the decision to place the end of his uninjured wing over the boy’s mouth, hopefully communicating his wish for him to shut up for a minute or two.

The boy seemed to get the idea, letting out only a muffled squeak at the sudden contact, and looked up at him with wide eyes. Marco shook his head. The child copied the motion. Then he moved his wing away. The boy was totally silent. Marco took that as understanding his gesture and set about properly inspecting his leg and wing.

The leg had been tightly wrapped in a, now, soiled bandage. It was shoddily done, if not functional. Too bad he needed to tear it away with his beak. The fabric gave easily to reveal the unclean wound, still coated in dried blood and mud, and the child panicked, “Don’t do that, I don’t have that many bandages.” He tried to re-wrap the leg until Marco poked his hand with his beak. “Hey! That hurts! You dumb bird, I’m trying to help!”

Marco chose to ignore him and prodded at the wound using his beak. It eventually hit something hard. The boy was still rambling when he yanked out the seastone bullet from the night before. His voice trickled to a stop at the sight of the blood soaked object held in his equally wet beak. Marco threw the bullet away before he turned his attention towards the steadily paling child. His mouth quivered, but he didn’t make a sound while the two of them stared into each other’s eyes.

The staring contest was broken when the boy dropped his head and quietly offered, “I’ll go get my first-aid kit…”

Marco’s brows furrowed at the sudden change in the boy’s demeanour. However, the re-opened wound on his leg was a more pressing issue.

\---

Usopp felt his hands shaking as he clutched the first-aid kit against his chest. The contents rattled inside, but he couldn’t hear any of it over the rapid beating of his heart. It felt like all of the blood in his body was in his ears while ice slithered across his veins.

It was his first time seeing anyone after they had been shot. Sure, he understood that that was how guns killed people, but to see someone (even an animal) pull something from a wound was...

Living things were fragile. Plants, animals, people, it didn’t matter; they all died eventually. Usopp knew he was old enough to understand that. His mother had told him that he was smart and that he could be told about grown up stuff like death because of it. Yet, none of that stopped the itchy sensation that would crawl across his skin whenever he made the conscious choice to think about the mortality of those around him.

None of it stopped him from wishing she was still with him.

Usopp snapped away from that line of thought the moment it flashed across his mind. Focus. Live in the moment. He stood up, praying that his knees would stop shaking enough to carry him back over to the bird, and made his way back to the creature. It was sat in the same place as before and used its beak to scrape at the bloodsoaked dirt surrounding the bullet wound. Usopp refused to gag at the sight while he held out the kit.

The bird shot him an unimpressed look before he realised how useless the box was to something without fingers. Doing the next best thing, Usopp sat in front of the bird and meekly asked, “Do you want some help with that?”

The bird simply observed him in response.

“I know I didn’t do a good job the first time, but I promise that I’ll do better now.” Usopp floundered, gesturing between himself and the wound, “It needs to be cleaned and you don’t have hands and I do, so...”

It blinked at him. Usopp gulped past the dryness of his throat. Then the bird nodded.

He smiled and went about grabbing a clean rag and bandage from the kit before grabbing his canteen. Usopp unscrewed the lid and peeked inside to find it drier than a desert. “Uh oh,” he muttered. The bird made a questioning sound which he answered with, “I’m all out of water... That’s okay though, I can fix that easily. Just wait here.”

Usopp dropped the empty canteen beside the first-aid kit and scrambled towards his bag. Various objects were thrown in as many directions as he dug through its contents, his upper body slowly being consumed, until he emerged with another, smaller, bag within his grasp. He took it with him on a trip to the shore and to the fruit trees.

All the while he could feel the bird’s eyes on his back.

He finished his journey a few feet away from the bird. Usopp grinned while setting up a strange looking apparatus above a small stack of sticks. A metal canister full of sea water on a tripod was connected to a long tube that led to a battered metal cup. The fire was lit with a flourish before Usopp took a step back and asked the bird with a gesture, “What do you think?”

It didn’t give much of a response besides boredom.

“Oh come on, be a little impressed,” Usopp pleaded. He pointed to parts of the structure while merrily explaining, “It’s for extracting water from sea water. It uses a thing called distillation, I read about it in a book once, and after the sea water boils eventually we’ll get a cup full of drinkable water.”

Still nothing.

“Really? Nothing at all?” Usopp questioned incredulously. He sighed and sat down next to the metal cup, “I guess after being at sea, something like this is silly.”

The bird reacted to that. It shook its head.

“Well then, if it’s not silly, why aren’t you impressed?” He asked with genuine curiosity.

It went into thought. Usopp figured that it was trying to think of a way to put it nicely, after all the ocean was full of much cooler things than his water distiller. But then it made some aborted gestures between the sea and his contraption. He didn’t quite understand what it was trying to say and when he voiced this the bird huffed. Usopp didn’t hold in the laugh that came as a reaction to the bird’s moodiness, “Sorry Birdy, I wish you could talk right now. That would be cool, a talking bird. It would be like magic.”

Another unimpressed look.

“Hey! Speaking of magic, you fell from the sky last night like a shooting star. Are you magic or something? Because that would be pretty cool,” Usopp cheerily asked.

The bird shook its head and lifted its wings, struggling to extend its broken one, to display the fire-like attributes of its feathers.

“So, you’re some kind of fire bird?”

A hesitant nod.

“That’s so cool!” Usopp exclaims. He rocks back and forth with excited energy while asking, “You must have seen tons of places, is the world really big?”

A quick nod.

“Did you get shot while travelling? Like by hunters.”

A head shake, so a ‘no’ for that one.

“For sport?”

Another ‘no’.

Usopp rubbed his chin in thought. Then he jokingly asked, “Was it because you got mixed up in some nefarious plot?”

That one got a nod. Blinking a couple times, Usopp took in the dark expression making its home on the bird’s face. It looked off into the distance, out to sea. He decided to drop the subject at that point.

\---

Marco was willing to answer the child’s questions, childish curiosity never hurt anything and he seemed harmless. However, they brought up some of his own about the situation he was in and, in particular, how he was going to get back to his crew.

The child eventually brought a cup of clean water over and began to silently clean and dress his wound. Marco left him to it while he thought things over. Sure, he would heal but he also didn’t know how long it would take (due to his own inexperience with wounds). That meant he would need a boat. He cast a glance towards the little raft and internally sighed. It would have to do.

Then there was the matter of his, hopefully, new sailing companion. Marco could tell that the boy had little to no experience of the world outside of wherever he had come from. Being stuck in his Zoan form without his other powers, like his regeneration or the ability to fly, would be a hindrance, so he’d have to depend on the child currently humming a weird tune in time with wrapping his cleaned leg. There was also the matter of how sporadic the boy seemed to be. Marco can admit to not having spent the largest amount of time around children of any age, but he also did know that a lot of people didn’t change demeanours at the drop of a hat.

There had to be a story there.

However, Marco wasn’t in a position to ask and neither did he particularly want to, given everything else he already had to think about.

The boy finished his work with a small bow and smiled at the bandage. Then he shuffled over to Marco’s injured wing to look it over. Marco only half listened to his suggestion of a splint before agreeing and watched him wander off once more. The boy was certainly resourceful, if a bit unsure of himself at times. He could do well at sea if given the proper training experience. Yet, time was not on Marco’s side.  
A small part of him just had to hope that the sea would be kind to them both.

-

The next morning came too quickly for Marco’s liking.

He had eventually learned the boy’s name, Usopp, between all of the long winded rants and questioning he insisted on doing to fill the silence. Marco hadn’t been as successful at communicating his own name to the boy. They had eventually settled on ‘Tori-san’; a name that Usopp had been certain about suiting him, Marco wasn’t so sure.

Usopp was in the middle of packing up his camp when Marco tugged on his bandana. He looked up from his work with a confused expression and asked, “Did you need something Tori-san?”

Nope, still didn’t sit right with him.

Marco nodded and pointed towards the log raft. Usopp followed his gesture before understanding lit up his face. He smiled while asking, “Do you want to come with me?”

He got a nod in response.

“Alright!” Usopp cheered. The tent tarp then proceeded to fall onto his head, ending the short celebration. Marco stepped back as the boy flailed under the large sheet for a while before falling to the ground and crawling out of it. Usopp let out an exaggerated gasp, “The sweet taste of freedom.”

Childish antics aside, he got back to efficiently taking done his camp and packing it away on the raft. They set sail again at about midday. The still water around them didn’t hinder their departure from the island but it also didn’t help to eventually push their raft further out to sea, like the ocean is supposed to. Usopp’s rowing powered the little raft forward despite this. He acted as though he was content to do his work and wasn’t questioning the frozen-in-time nature of the water around them.

Marco, however, regarded the ocean with an analytic eye. A motionless ocean was something that any seasoned sailor feared. The calm waters were a pristine curtain to a theatre of deadly horrors that dragged ships to the inky depths - never to be seen alive again. It was a nightmare ocean acting as the guard dog to the most dangerous waters in the world.

And they were stuck in the middle of it.

As if the universe was setting off a confetti cannon in celebration at his correct conclusion, the ocean erupted in front of their raft. Usopp screamed at the top of his lungs and scrambled away from the edge of the boat. He dove behind Marco while the Zoan instinctively puffed himself up. From the water burst came a Sea King, its booming roar vibrating the very air as it slithered out of the ocean, and it brought a lot of friends.

The raft was thrown into the air, both of them along with it.

“Not again!” Usopp shrieked as he clung to the feathers on Marco’s back.

Marco braced his legs to jump into action. Then he remembered his injuries, white hot pain shooting across his nerves like a morning alarm clock on a Saturday. The hands on his back tightened momentarily at the strangled cry that left his throat. Usopp tried to call out to him but the sound was swallowed by another Sea King’s roar. The noise came as a reaction to the raft colliding with the beast’s back before it started to slide down the Sea King’s wet scales.

Marco took charge of the situation by grabbing the mast of the ship while Usopp kept a hold on his back, his own bag and oar. The boy’s screaming was beginning to become background noise to their little adventure. It was also attracting the attention of the other Sea Kings, their hungry eyes turning to stare at the meal sliding down their companion’s back. However, Marco couldn’t move to quiet Usopp’s fearful wailing so he resigned himself to the fact that his deathbed may end up being an unknown stretch on the Calm Belt, miles away from any part of his family.

Then Usopp stopped screaming.

The dry, wheezing cough that followed made sense given how much strain constantly yelling would put on a person’s airways. Some quiet to peacefully ponder his own death, Marco supposed. He could hear the movement of the Sea Kings in the water and their hunger filled growls, all of it close enough to send a cold shiver up his spine. He felt so powerless. He felt so goddamn useless. He had his crew, his family, and the people in that village under the foot of a madman to go back to. People that were depending on his strength to see this through.

His Devil Fruit may have taken his ability to swim but, even without water, it felt like he was drowning in that moment.

In that instant, despite the turmoil, Marco noticed the faint sound of something that wasn’t part of his impending demise. He shut everything else out to focus on what he figured out to be Usopp’s frantic muttering and his frenzied battle with the contents of that mysterious bag of his. The boy’s barely coherent words struck a chord.

“Come on, come on, come on. It won’t mean anything if it ends like this.”

The rustling stopped, the weight of the bag was settled between them, and something snapped behind his back. Usopp warned shakily, clearly uncertain of whatever he was doing outside of Marco’s view, “This thing is still experimental, you’ll have to close your eyes.” Marco didn’t have time to comply before another snap met his ears and a bright flash lit up the sky.

White light filled his vision while an explosion took over his sense of hearing. The instinct to flinch and hide away from it all was apparent. However, by the sounds of the Sea Kings’ cries, and the splashes that erupted around them, they shared his opinion. The Sea King beneath them shifted as well. The raft was thrown into the air once more. The wind rushed past them at a greater speed than before. 

And Usopp started screaming again.

However, Marco couldn’t find it in himself to be annoyed by the sound when he opened his eyes to see the Sea Kings getting further away from them.

\---

Their landing after the Sea King encounter was anything but smooth. The raft unceremoniously crashed into the still water around them, miles from their previous position. It shattered on impact. Half of the already battered vessel split away from the rest of it to drift off into the distance.

Usopp found himself unable to care. The wood could sink to the bottom of the ocean and he wouldn’t even complain at this point. Part of the raft had survived. They had survived. He had distracted giant sea monsters and kept them alive. Him, Usopp; he had saved the day. He and Tori-san were alive to see another morning.

Tori-san!

Usopp shot up from his previous position on what was left of the raft’s deck. His bag and the oar were still firmly in his grasp, but his new friend had slipped away during their unscheduled flight. After a frantic glance around, during which he noticed that dusk had somehow snuck up on them while everything else had been happening, he found Tori-san watching the sky darken above them.

The bird looked over and Usopp felt his heart sink. He noticed the lost look in his eyes. It was an expression he had seen in the mirror more times than he could count. It was strange seeing another person wearing it. No, strange wasn’t the word, more like concerning. It stirred up something in the pit of his stomach that made him sick.

‘You’re such a good boy Usopp, always so smart. You fixed it for me, didn’t you?’

Mom?

‘You should go outside and play. Can’t have you keeping me company all day, a boy your age should be spending time with friends.’

Usopp didn’t want to leave though. He’d already left everything else. Did Tori-san want to leave then? Like he had with Syrup Village.

‘Tell me another story Usopp. It’ll make me feel better, I promise.’

His stories.

Sometimes they were the only thing that made his life worth living. His singular chance to grasp at something outside of himself and put a momentary smile on his mother’s face. The face that slowly grew more sunken in and pale as his memories tapered towards the day she left him alone. The smile they caused remained the same, bright as the sun and just as warm.

Would Tori-san smile too?

“H-hey, do you want to hear about the Princess of the Moon?” Usopp offered with the most carefree smile he could muster.

Tori-san raised an uncertain eyebrow in response.

“Oh yeah, there’s an entire kingdom on the moon. It’s made from moon rock and space magic, with lights that twinkle like the night sky.” He went on, growing more confident as he spun his tall tale, “It was a happy place, filled with parties every night when we’re all asleep and can’t hear it, ruled by a beautiful Queen and her King. Everyone loved them. But they loved the Princess even more. She was perfect in every way you could think of; kind, creative, pretty.”

The bird huffed at that one.

“Yet, this made her very lonely.”

Usopp’s eyes left his friend to trail towards the sky. He brought his knees to his chest, hugging his shins, and continued with a less steady tone.

“No one noticed the distance they had created by placing her in such high regard. She was perfect after all, and they weren’t, so it just made sense.”

He curled further into himself the longer he spoke.

“Then she went missing. The Queen was distraught. She pleaded for a hero to go and find her lost daughter, but none came to her aid.”

He heard Tori-san move outside of his field of vision. The disjointed shuffling of his claws against the wooden deck gave Usopp pause.

“Until a Star Bird promised to find her.”  
Usopp felt something warm brush his side. He didn’t turn to see what it was, lest he risk breaking the quiet of the moment.

“The Star Bird was a shining blue bird made from the tail of a shooting star, born of wishes and dreams. It could glide across the entire sky in a single night, twice if it wanted to show off. If it couldn’t find the Princess then no one could.”

A weight on his head. A steady presence in light of the shaking he hadn’t noticed before.

“It flew past the horizon the moment the sun set, further than any moon person had ever been, and found the Princess in the clutches of a Great Dragon. A ferocious lizard that breathed fire made of sunlight that could melt the meat right off your bones. It lashed out at the Star Bird, until the bird could no longer use its impressive wings to fly away to safety.”

A comforting touch to his back. Usopp wondered how long he could keep going before Tori-san made him shut up again.

“The Bird fought as hard as it could, but nothing worked on the Dragon. All hope seemed lost...”

Kind of like you Tori-san.

“Until the Princess broke out from its clutches in a burst of magic. She took the Bird away and ran further from the horizon, to places no one had ever explored. She didn’t stop until they were safe.”

Usopp felt the heaviness of his eyelids start to get to him. His own words sounded muffled in his ears, like he was talking underwater. The pressure on his back was the only thing keeping him upright.

“Safe... But lost.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for reading this chapter.  
> I hope it was a good read for all of you.  
> If anyone can guess why Usopp calls Marco Tori-san then they'll be getting a virtual pat on the back from me. :D  
> Please comment and tell me your thoughts, it really encourages me to write more.


	4. A Series of Questions Without Answers

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In times of uncertainty we can find ourselves asking questions. They may not have answers, at least not ones we want to hear.
> 
> Marco and Usopp find themselves doing just that.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ahhh! Sorry for the laster than usually posting! I try to have one of these posted per week and I almost forgot about this week.  
> I've been working on other shorter projects (which are now done) that will hopefully be posted soon for your enjoyment.

Row. Row. Row.

How long had he been rowing?

Row. Row. Row.

How much further would he need to row?

Row. Row. Row.

It had been two days since the start of their joint adventure and Usopp hadn’t stopped rowing with all his might.

The incident with the sea monsters solidified, in his mind, the idea that they needed to keep moving on this weird motionless sea around them. Sure, they had escaped, but only by sheer dumb luck. Staying in the middle of an uncaring ocean wasn’t going to do them any favours either.

However, this also meant that Usopp had to do all the work while Tori-san restlessly sat near his bag and acted as lookout for more sea monsters. Usopp could tell that their near encounter with death was still bothering the bird, yet he couldn’t find a way to bring it up without the fear of immediately driving a wedge between them. Words were something that had always come easily to him, weaving childish lies and tales of adventures at the speed of a landslide; so, why were the right ones evading him?

The silence between them was suffocating.

Usopp sighed as he dragged his oar through the water once more. The burn in his arm muscles had stopped being a bother after the first day of complaining, which was also getting them nowhere. He had expected Tori-san to smack him on the back of the head or quiet him with his wing like before for being loud, something which he had figured out bothered the bird during his screaming sessions, but neither thing ever happened. Tori-san had just looked at him in exasperation, well as exasperated as a bird could look, and interest when he actually stopped whining to talk about whatever was on his mind.

It was a weird companionship, especially given the fact that Usopp was doing all of the talking between them. They had to fill the time somehow.

Usopp was about to go on a tangent about a random topic when something far more interesting caught his attention in the distance. They were faint, little things, totally insignificant in any other circumstance. Minute curls and dips on the surface of the ocean that gradually grew more noticeable. They were waves, actual signs of ocean currents that could pull their raft along with them. Usopp almost started crying at the sight of them. He didn’t though, because that would probably make Tori-san feel awkward and would not at all be embarrassing for Usopp in any way - nope, not at all.

He did stop rowing and point at them with a yell, “We made it! It’s the actual ocean again!” Usopp teetered on the side of the raft, “Do you see it Tori-san?”

There was a call in response before Usopp felt his world tilt sideways. His knee slipped over the edge of the boat, dipping into the frigid water below, and he yelped while flailing his arms about, a terribly conceived attempt to steady himself. The expected splash never met his ears, however, when something caught the back of his overalls. The piece of clothing yanked against his throat but he didn’t mind as it was accompanied by his safe, and dry, return to the raft’s deck.

Usopp coughed a couple of times, during which he took the time to rub at his throat, and rasped, “Thanks.” Tori-san started patting his back. After catching his breath, Usopp looked up at the bird and smiled, “That was so cool, you moved so fast. I didn’t even see you.”

Tori-san huffed, shaking his head.

“What?” Usopp asked childishly. He laughed when the bird’s expression got more unimpressed at his antics. Then he added, “You saved me Tori-san.”

\---

Sometimes the sea could be cruel.

Sometimes the sea could be loving.

Sometimes the sea could be an asshole that liked to play sick jokes on sailors for nothing more than its own amusement, treating them like meaningless toys.

Marco knew all of this. He had lived for years at sea and had grown to both fear and adore it. However, even he had moments when he questioned whether anyone was capable of ever truly understanding its whims.

They’d made it to the Grand Line, through the Calm Belt no less.

He had known after an afternoon of them drifting aimlessly on its waves. Marco recognised the discordant currents that warred with each other to pull them in several directions at once, but ended up taking them nowhere at all. They were sailing on the most dangerous ocean on the planet on a log raft. 

Marco wanted to pinch himself - just to check whether he was dreaming - but without fingers he’d have to wait a while for that. Or maybe he could somehow get Usopp to pinch himself, see if he was existing in the dream of a child; on second thought, that idea wasn’t something he wanted to consider sober.   
Speaking of Usopp, the boy seemed content to let their little beaten up raft move with the currents and, after three days of rowing, Marco didn’t blame him. He was also excited to try his hand at fishing now that they didn't have to worry about Sea Kings, Marco wasn’t surprised when Usopp started referring to them solely as ‘sea monsters’. The kid rambled for what felt like hours, not realising that his constant chatter was probably the reason he hadn’t caught anything, about how he had begged the fisherman in his hometown to teach him but they kept refusing due to his age. Marco knew that was just an excuse on their part.

However, Marco just peacefully sat against the mast and listened. The sounds reminded him of home, being back with his family, and it was enough to picture himself back on the Moby if he closed his eyes. Usopp’s way of talking was also pleasant. Sure, he didn’t have the sweetest sounding voice but his inclination to focus on the smaller details, with little relevance to whatever story he was trying to tell, and go off on tangents at random moments was kind of endearing. 

Usopp was a boy with everything and nothing to say all at once.

The story from their first night at sea was different though. Usopp had been focused. The narrative was short, simple, but told him more about who Usopp was than Marco thought he had wanted to share. Some connecting details were still fuzzy; it was clear that he had run away from something or someone. That made two of them. The far off look on the boy’s face was also a dead giveaway to a larger narrative. 

Usopp had looked so lost, like a man without a map on a deserted island. Marco, or the part of him that felt as if the weight of everyone’s problems rested on his shoulders alone, wanted to know more. What had driven a child away from their home and out to sea alone? Why did it seem like Usopp was used to being dependent on himself at such a young age? Where was he trying to go, if anywhere at all? All of these questions without answers.

Then there was the reaction he’d given Usopp. Call it what you will, the animalistic instincts of his Zoan, an emotional connection intrinsic to all human beings, empathy, but something had made physically comforting the boy as he tried to keep his eyes open and finish his fiction, for reasons that Marco had a feeling pertained to him, seem right - like it was the only option in that moment. Maybe he was just being soft on the kid because of how genuinely pitiful he acted around any sign of danger; that didn’t sound right either.

Another thing Marco didn’t have the answer to.

Pondering life’s mysteries would have to wait, Usopp made a sound of surprise. Marco thought he had finally caught a fish, which would be a surprise at this point, but was perplexed when he noticed that the fishing rod had already been set down at Usopp’s side. The boy, instead, had pulled out a telescope to get a better look at something in the distance. “Hey Tori-san, what kind of ship is that?” Usopp asked while holding out the object.

Marco raised his uninjured wing to take the offered telescope before recognising his mistake. No hands. Usopp, thankfully, must have suddenly become a mind reader and offered a quiet ‘sorry’ as he brought the telescope to his eye level. His grip was shaky but Marco couldn’t complain, he was already being accommodated for after all. The ship in question was easy to spot through the device.

It was very clearly a trading ship. Small without any markings and a bustling deck. It had barely any visible weapons, nor did any of the people on the deck look heavily armed either. One thing, however, did throw Marco for a loop; its hull was decorated in overly curvy gold lettering that was impossible to read. There were no other words to describe it besides an assault on the eyes.

Then it turned towards them.

The telescope was dropped in Usopp’s excitement. He hastily corrected his mistake while asking, “Is it just me or is it getting closer?”

Marco turned away from the edge of the boat; he ignored Usopp’s question in the process. He began to nose at the opening in Usopp’s bag for something useful.

Trading ships meant traders. All kinds of traders sailed across the Grand Line, not all of them carrying ‘moral’ cargo. Marco’s instincts told him to expect the worst, which was currently the kind of people who wouldn’t think twice about throwing a rare bird and a defenseless child in cages after finding them adrift. Usopp obviously didn’t think in the same way; he had already been openly welcoming enough to invite Marco along. So, he would make a plan around that.

“Tori-san?” Usopp asked as Marco pulled out the waterproof tarp. He threw it over the deck and crawled underneath it, as much as he could with his injuries. Usopp’s head followed after him and he repeated, “Tori-san?”

“Hey! Everything alright down there?” A woman’s voice called out from a distance above them.

Usopp left the darkness of the tarp to answer whoever had shouted, “Yes!”

“Are you all alone, little boy?” She questioned with audible concern.

Marco wasn’t so sure.

“Nope, Tori-san’s here too,” Usopp answered honestly.

“Tori-san?”

“He’s under the tarp. I think he’s being shy, since you guys are strangers,” he explained.

Marco knew if he was in his regular body he’d be blushing at the idea of him being shy. Whitebeard’s First Commander being shy, it sounded like a bad joke even in his own head.  
“That’s pretty smart of Tori-san. You don’t know who you’ll run into in these waters,” the woman praised in a tone clearly meant to be mocking him.

Exactly, now fuck off.

What Marco wouldn’t give to be able to talk in his Zoan form.

“Really? You’re the first people we’ve met since we found waves again,” Usopp asked and Marco felt the urge to smack him on the back of the head again.

“Found waves again?” Came a man’s voice.

“Oh yeah, it’s full of nasty people that won’t think twice about sinking a little raft like yours,” the woman interjected, ignoring the other voice entirely. “You should come up here where it’s safe. We can drop you off on the next island, if you want.”

Her companion seemed to take issue with this proposition as the two voices above them started arguing. Marco didn’t tune into that conversation, because Usopp came back underneath the tarp, light from his back making him a black figure in Marco’s eyes, to ask, “What do you think Tori-san?”

What did he think? Everything in his body screamed for him to drag Usopp under the tarp with him and ignore the traders until they left or came down to show their true colours and left themselves open to being pushed into the ocean. Yet, neither of those plans would work. Marco mentally cursed. How had everything in his life gone to shit so quickly? How had it gotten to the point where his only course of action was to hide himself beneath a sheet while a child he barely knew spoke for him to people that were very likely going to try to kill them?

More questions.

“Can we trust them?” Usopp asked in response to his prolonged motionlessness.

No.

Marco couldn’t admit that though. Their boat was in shambles and neither of them had any way of navigating. It was a miracle the sea hadn’t swallowed them up already and cursed their bodies to an eternal existence on the ocean floor. By all accounts, they should have been dead already.

He nodded.

\---

Usopp always wondered what it would be like to sail as part of an actual crew. He had imagined himself as the captain of that crew, but this was still an educational experience.

The man and woman, named Fidio and Migen respectively, had helped him bring his stuff and the immovable Tori-san on board. The bird in question refused to leave the safety of the tarp around anyone other than Usopp; something which the pair had taken in stride with abundant smiles and jokes. They had also been nice enough to give them a bed in the ship’s cargo hold so Tori-san wouldn’t be uncomfortable. As well as cooked food, Usopp couldn’t forget about that part. It was so yummy and warm compared to what they had been eating on the raft.

All of this came with the agreement that Usopp would help around the ship as their one and only crewman - they were both co-captains of a ship without anyone else on it. This meant that he did all of the jobs that they didn’t want to do; which turned out to be a lot of them. They kept him on his feet from sunrise to sunset with orders that only made sense half of the time. Was this what life at sea was?

It had only been three days and Usopp was starting to hurt all over - again.

Tori-san stayed in the cargo hold while he worked and listened to his complaints at meal times and before Usopp passed out from exhaustion at the end of every day. He was annoyed by their situation, Usopp could tell, but there was nothing either of them could do about it with Fidio and Migen calling on the boy at all hours of the daytime. 

If only Tori-san wasn’t so shy.

Usopp tried not to dwell on the negatives going into his fourth day working on the trading ship. His friend had acted reluctant to let him leave that morning. Tori-san had tugged at his wrist, his wing resting against his back in a way that had Usopp think it was a hug, and he’d made a soft sound in his ear. It made Usopp feel all fuzzy on the inside, like his stomach had been turned into cotton balls in his sleep.

He stepped out onto the deck with a smile. Then came Migen’s giggle, “Morning Snosy.”

The smile then jumped ship and Usopp quietly greeted, “Morning Ma'am.”

“Boo! You didn’t even complain about the nickname this morning!” The woman laughed as she smacked the back of his head, in a weird parody of an otherwise playful gesture.

Usopp gave her a shaky grin. He had gotten used to the jabs, taking it as a joke at his expense, but the physical hits were new. He figured that it was just part of her personality to be mean to new people through jokes. It made sense in light of her childish and uncoordinated appearance - large, bright hair and clothes to match.

“So, Snosy, how’s Tori-san today? Ready to meet yours truly?” Migen asked while she lolled over him. Usopp froze in place at the contact. She also had a habit of touching him in ways that made him feel like his skin was crawling.

“Not yet, he’s still hiding,” Usopp answered with a carefree tone.  
“Too bad…” She pouted. The disappointed expression dropped a moment later before it was replaced with a grin as she sang, “That just means we get to play today!”

Usopp bit his tongue. ‘Play’ was putting it mildly.

“He’ll be spending the day with me actually,” Fidio interrupted in his shockingly deep voice. His voice was a shock due to the noodley and bland appearance of the man himself - think the colour of cooked noodles as a person.

“Awww…” Megin whined.

Usopp didn’t pay attention to the ensuing argument as he bit his tongue hard enough to draw blood. That was even worse. Despite his unassuming appearance, Fidio was a cruel man that liked giving Usopp unreasonable tasks, like re-rigging the entire mast by himself in the rain. 

Maybe he could fake a contagious illness and escape work for a day or two. He didn’t know if either of them were doctors, or had any kind of medical knowledge, but the calculating look Fidio cast over him when he and Megin stopped talking was enough to bring Usopp’s ideas to a grinding halt. 

“With me,” Fidio didn’t leave room for argument as he led the way back below deck, not even waiting to see if Usopp had moved to follow behind him. He didn’t need to check, of course; Usopp trailed silently at his feet while the pair travelled down many shadowy hallways to the man’s office. The office itself was immaculate. The room was sparsely decorated and with very little furnishings, a desk, a couple of chairs and some well organised shelves, to clutter the space. It was sterile to the point it was scary, as if dust was too afraid to even touch anything in fear of messing up the perfect space. 

Despite the lack of any dust, Usopp found it hard to breathe when they entered. His entire body was bracing itself in preparation for whatever unending list of tasks the man had put together for the day. It remained locked in an at-attention position, his back ramrod straight while his knees did their best not to give away his inner unease, until Fidio motioned for him to sit on the other side of his desk.

The man sat on the edge of the desk while Usopp took the assigned chair. “So Usopp, how are you? I apologise if Migen was overly friendly this morning, she’s just bored and you’re a new toy to play with for her. You must understand these things.” Fidio inquired with the friendliest smile the man could muster.

Usopp thought it looked weird on his face, like his mouth wasn’t used to the action, but answered, “I’m fine.”

“That’s good,” Fidio commented. He stood up from the desk to walk somewhere outside of Usopp’s range of sight, sending shivers down the boy’s spine, “And what about Tori-san? We have yet to see this mysterious friend of yours.”  
“He’s good too,” was the only answer to his prodding.

“Any chance we’ll be seeing him soon? It’d be sad if we didn’t get to meet him before we get to the next island tomorrow,” Fidio went on. He began tapping on the back of the chair.

“We’re reaching an island soon?” Usopp asked with genuine curiosity.

An island would mean freedom from the trading ship. It also meant that he and Tori-san could go on an adventure like Usopp had planned. A real life chance to find unexplored places, like a cave to the centre of the world!

“Woah! Calm down there kid, can’t have you bouncing off the walls in here,” the man behind him joked. A hand came down on top of Usopp’s head without warning to stop him vibrating. Fidio then grabbed the sides of his head to tilt it back to lean over him and stare into Usopp’s wide eyes. The boy gulped while he asked, “So, what do you say? Bring Tori-san out onto deck for dinner this evening.”

“Are you guys gonna cook him for dinner?” Usopp panicked.

“Of course not!” Fidio chuckled, “We just want to know more about him. We don’t even know what he looks like.”

Usopp made a long ‘oh’ sound and proceeded to go on a rant about how cool Tori-san looked. He kept insisting that the bird was the most amazing one in the entire world, he wasn’t lying either. Seriously, how many times had Fidio seen a bird look like a shooting star and crash down to earth right in front of him? Probably none.

In his excitement to gush about his friend, Usopp failed to notice the smirk that gradually creeped onto the man’s face. The same smile dropped by the time Fidio was done with his blabbering and sent him to work with a list of chores longer than Usopp was tall.

\---

When Usopp returned to the cargo hold that night Marco could only watch from his place on their bedding as he flopped face first next to him. The boy stayed in the same position for a long time, a group of moments where the singular sound in the room was their breathing, until he rolled over with a groan, “Everything hurts…”

Marco used his wing to pat his forehead in an understanding gesture.

Usopp laughed at the contact and tried to swat the feathers away, “That tickles!”

Oh, that was new.

Being the fair person that he was, Marco then poked at his side. Usopp let out a long ‘no’ while rolling away from the wing. He came to a stop on his back and whined, “You’re being mean.”

Marco laughed, a sound that came out as a trill.

They fell into a content silence after that for a while. Marco took the time to take in the, once again, exhausted appearance of his companion. Usopp was sporting more than a few scrapes and bruises. Any time he had prodded at them the boy had just written them off as accidents; turns out Usopp was clumsy when he got excited about things and working on a ship was something he classed as fun enough to have him bouncing off the walls - what Marco wouldn’t give to have an entire crew of men who felt the same way about their chores. However, his words weren’t an adequate remedy to Marco’s concerns.

The phrase ‘Mother Hen’ was passed around his head for a bit, the other Commanders would have a field day if they ever found out.

“How are you feeling Tori-san? Think you’ll be able to walk by tomorrow?” Usopp asked towards the ceiling.

A bit specific but good question. Marco nosed at the bandage on his leg for what felt like the millionth time since it had been put on. The wound beneath it still hurt if he poked directly at it. Yet, he could put weight on it if he was careful - no running so the coagulated blood wouldn’t tear.

So, Marco nodded.

“Do you want me to take it off?” Was the question that followed.

Another nod.

Usopp swung himself into an upright position and happily instructed, “Just sit still while I do it, okay? I’m not great with stuff like this yet.” Nevertheless, he was careful in unwrapping the dirtied fabric from around Marco’s leg. The wound underneath was just as Marco had expected it to be. It was an unpleasant pink eyesore against the striking blue of his feathers, but he could live with it until he got his powers back. Usopp winced at the sight of it and voiced his sympathy, “Sorry I couldn’t do more to help it heal.”

Marco shook his head and made a flippant motion with his wing.

Usopp blinked a couple of times before saying with a smile, “Alright then.” He left to throw away the old bandages while Marco tested his injured wing. It was still stiff and bending it too far would send sharp stabs of pain throughout his upper body; no flying for a little while longer.

When the boy returned he threw himself onto the bedding, laughing when he bounced off of it a couple of times, on his back. Marco smacked him jokingly on the face for the jostling which started another fit of laughter. “Hey, do you wanna hear more about the Princess and the Star Bird?” Usopp offered through his wing.

What prompted this?

Marco wanted to ask, but once again he had no way of speaking. Being a bird sucked sometimes. Doing the only thing that he could, he nodded.

“We left off at the best part last time, because you see…” Usopp began confidently.

“The Princess and the Bird had escaped the Dragon by running further than the horizon. They ran to a place without a name, well it might have had a name but neither of them knew it, where everything was dark,” he recounted with a flourish.

Marco contently, silently, sat beside him while Usopp animatedly told his story. “They wandered for days in the dark. But, no matter how far they went, nothing around them looked familiar and with no stars to guide them, they were lost.”

He trilled on reflex.

“Hey! Don’t laugh! It was serious,” Usopp complained. He sat up to better look him in the eye, “Them being lost meant that they couldn’t find all the missing constellations.”

Marco tilted his head to the side in a gesture that screamed ‘oh really’.

“Yeah!” Usopp sagely nodded, “Past the horizon had once been a bright and lovely place until all of the constellations were stolen. Without them, the stars were scattered and began to fade, being so far away from each other. They were lonely without people close to them.” The last sentence was said at a much quieter volume, as if the boy was afraid of breaking the words coming out of his mouth by speaking them too loudly.

“So, the Princess and the Star Bird vowed to find them before they went home. Even without a map, they promised each other that they were going to stick together and make the sky past the horizon bright again,” Usopp assured as he grew closer to a whisper. His voice was hopeful.

Marco didn’t expect him to lean into his feathers without warning.

“By staying side by side, back to back, they’d be able to do anything,” he finished before burying his face into the front of Marco’s torso.

He felt Usopp’s small hands grip onto fistfulls of his feathers. Usopp was clearly shaking like a leaf and Marco didn’t know whether or not he should move to comfort him. The answer was taken out of his hands when the boy’s grip shifted into a very obvious hug, all the while staying totally silent. So he reciprocated the embrace.

“Are you going to leave when your wing is healed, Tori-san?” He asked in a small, muffled voice. Without giving him time to answer, Usopp added, “I wouldn’t blame you. You’ve got a life outside of this trip and I’ve got my own.”

The quiver in his voice said otherwise and Marco knew it.

He tucked himself further into the hug, which in turn brought Usopp closer as well, and cooed. The sound was like a lead weight dipped in honey, but it was sweet and felt right for the emotions of the moment. Marco didn’t know what would happen when he found his crew again; however, he was certain that he’d bring Usopp along with him for as long as he could. They’d have the adventure at sea the boy was dreaming of. Then, when he got his body back, he’d ask whether or not Usopp still wanted to stay with him. 

He just wasn’t sure about which answer he wanted to hear yet.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I hope you enoyed this chapter. Sorry if it was kind of a bummer. Next week's chapter may be a bit late depending on when inspiration strikes - it's been a bit fickle as of late.  
> Please comment and tell me what you thought of this chapter!  
> Until next time... Bye-bye!


	5. In Consideration of the Unknown

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> How often should one look back to the past when also running away from it?
> 
> When does the future become so uncertain that it feels like everything around us is caving in?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Aaaah! I'm so sorry this took so long to write. It's longer than the other chapters to try and make up for the wait.
> 
> I should be getting ch6 writing soon too so please be kind.

“What do you think Tori-san?” Usopp asked as he held up a compact mirror in front of the bird. 

The pair sat on their temporary bed in the cargo hold of the merchants’ ship. They were set to make land by midday; so they spent their morning preparing for the disembarking ahead of them. This prepwork involved Usopp coming up with an ‘ingenious’ solution to Tori-san’s shyness.

It was a cape.

Or was it a cloak?

Usopp didn’t know what it was called but it was cool, in his opinion. He used his waterproof tarp and some rope to create a temporary outfit for his friend. That way Tori-san wouldn’t be so shy in public. The material draped over his head and his back in a manner that covered his entire body when secured with a rope around his collar.

Tori-san blinked at his reflection before leveling Usopp with an unimpressed stare. The boy nervously laughed, “What? I thought it would be nice to be able to walk around together. But you’re so shy and I didn’t want to make you uncomfortable.”

The bird’s brows furrowed and he tilted his head to the side. Usopp bit his lip as Tori-san inspected himself in the mirror again. There were moments of thoughtful silence before the bird nodded, allowing Usopp to let out the breath he had been holding. He also fluffed out his wings for good measure and adjusted the fabric with a satisfied shake.

“I’m kind of jealous,” Usopp admitted with a shy smile. He stood up from the bedding to grab his bag, “You look like a mysterious stranger, or a caped hero.”

Tori-san huffed in a way that made Usopp think it was a laugh.

His smile grew more confident, “I can’t wait to see another village. Do you think that we’ll see anything interesting?” Usopp placed the bag over his shoulder.

The response was a so-so shift of Tori-san’s head.

“It’s an unknown adventure then,” Usopp announced. He struck a confident pose before dropping it a moment later. Then he started to hop from one foot to the other while worrying his hands, “But what if we run into another monster? I don’t have any more exploding pellets.”

A coo called his attention towards Tori-san as the bird cast him a stern look.

“What?” Usopp blurted out, still dancing about nervously.  
Tori-san shook himself again before smiling and nodding his head towards the boy.

“Shake myself?” Usopp asked. He stopped moving to meet the bird’s amused expression with one of confusion. “What’s that going to do?”

The bird rolled his eyes before repeating the motion.

Usopp huffed, “Fine, fine. Just don’t laugh at me.” He copied the motion for a moment. Tension left his body as he forced his limbs to break out of their awkwardly locked positions, but he couldn’t help the slight embarrassment that replaced his anxiety. 

Tori-san quietly trilled.

Usopp let his stance drop before muttering, “That was stupid.” It lacked any venom and Tori-san took the opportunity to pat him on the head. A small moment of content silence fell between them. Neither moving away from the other as Usopp allowed the warm gesture to take effect.

His heart felt light, like it was made of newly fluffed pillows, and his head was quieter than it had been a moment before. Usopp wasn’t sure if he could explain the urge he had to fold himself against Tori-san’s side and sleep until everything in his life wasn’t so hectic. The soft noises the bird made when he leaned into the touch definitely didn’t help the fuzzy feeling that trickled through his bones as if they were being dipped into a freshly drawn bath.

The silence was broken by the motion of the boat and a sickening scraping sound along the outer hull that echoed throughout the cargo hold and Usopp’s ears. He flinched at the grating noise, reflexively covering his ears, while Tori-san visibly grimaced. Some things hit the ground around them as the boat’s entire structure shook to a deafening halt; the scattered supplies went unnoticed in favour of listening to the loud argument that began above their heads.

The pair looked at each other, a silent question of ‘are you okay’ passing between them, before Tori-san cautiously stood up and gestured towards the door. Usopp grinned while positioning his bag against his back so he could take the lead. His hand stopped on the door handle, the feeling of the cold metal made him take note of how clammy his hands were. He glanced back at their little bed and the recently made chaos of the cargo hold.

Was it weird that he was going to miss it?

Usopp looked towards Tori-san who watched him expectantly.

Yeah. It was definitely weird.

\---

Marco stepped onto the cobbled surface of the waterfront street and took a lungful of fresh air. The stark contrast between the salt licked sea breeze and the stagnant air of the stale smelling cargo hold was like night and day. 

The wind accompanied the faint sound of waves hitting the sea wall around the port. The vapour that each crash threw into the air permeated into everything it could and left a damp feeling on Marco’s feathers. He had half a mind to ruffle them to alleviate the wet sensation but stopped himself in light of the fragility of his disguise; if the flimsy waterproof tent tarp and rope fastening that had been hastily draped across him could really be called that.

Marco had to give it to Usopp for his quick thinking. It was a skill that, despite his occasional floundering and bouts of rambled uncertainty, they had both relied on thus far. However, Marco was determined to put his best foot forward during their time on this island - which he also needed to find out the name of; he wasn’t sure Usopp’s wide eyed wonder would do them any favours in trying to haggle prices with shop owners.

He let out a trilling chuckle as the boy in question dashed ahead of him along the dockside street. The street vendors seemed to share his joviality by offering Usopp welcoming smiles when he started to ask questions about their wares. Marco decided not to eavesdrop and found fulfilment in meandering behind him as they slowly made their way to the main street.

Usopp stopped at the last stand before the corner, one selling an array of seafood, and turned to Marco to ask, “Do you have any ideas for dinner? We don’t have enough beli to eat out so we should cook something nice.”

Marco made a sound of agreement but tilted his head at the food on display. He had never been one for fancy cooking, or any cooking at all really, since he considered eating an entirely necessary activity that one had to partake in - whether the thing they were consuming tasted good or not. His own eating habits had gotten him into more than one argument with Thatch.

He could still remember the time he had said that they shouldn’t spend so much on food because certain expensive things tasted better. Marco still couldn’t tell the difference between ‘quality’ ingredients and standard ones, but it had made the galley crew determined to prove him wrong.

Usopp made a thoughtful hum as he inspected the fish; his hand rested on his chin while he muttered, “Maybe frying it… I don’t have any oil though...”

Marco sighed. Maybe Usopp overthought things, but who was he to call him out on it. He was about to motion for them to continue on their way since they could always come back if need be, but was stopped when a pitchy call rang out behind them, “Snosy! There you are! Are you really leaving so soon?”

Usopp flinched at the sound. He turned his attention away from the stand to weakly reply over Marco’s shoulder, “Yeah, sorry Ma’am. We wanted to get an early start. Tori-san’s afraid of the dark as well you know.”

Marco’s glare was ignored as Usopp kept his unsettled focus on the interruption.

“Aw, that’s too bad. The best stuff happens after dark in places like this,” Migen’s fake laughter rang out in the air above Marco’s head. He grimaced when her hand started to pick at the hood of his cloak and tried to shake her away. “Someone’s in a bad mood.”

“What kind of stuff happens after dark?” Usopp asked, trying to shuffle himself into the space between Marco and the woman.

Smart plan. Marco wasn’t sure if he could resist pecking at Megin’s filthy hand.

There was more shuffling behind him. Usopp made a sound of discomfort that did nothing to stop the thoughts of mild violence that flashed through Marco’s head. Megin giggled and clapped her hands, “Why don’t you come with me and see?”

Something about the lilt of her voice sent a shiver skittering along Marco’s spine. He glimpsed at the store vendor, a burly man with a chestnut beard that more than made up for the lack of hair on his head in an apron, who also didn’t look impressed by the situation before he chanced a look at Usopp. The boy was caught under the overbearing weight of the woman obliviously pawing at his overalls as Usopp tried to maintain a friendly expression and distance between them.

Marco didn’t have to think twice about ramming his head into her stomach. He was grateful that the hood stayed in place while he knocked the woman to the ground. The notable thud and surprised yelp that followed his act of heroism made up for the light throbbing in his head and the dull pain in his leg caused by the sudden jolt of movement.

Megin stayed sprawled out on the ground for a few moments while Marco collected himself and checked his disguise. He checked back with the fish vendor to see the man holding back from getting involved, if his strained demeanor and how firmly he crossed his arms across his chest was anything to go by.

That could work.

Marco took an instinctive step back towards Usopp when she shot back up into a sitting position. The rage that coloured her features was matched by the fire burning in her eyes as she glared towards the partially covered face of the bird in front of her. Marco tilted his head to the side in an obvious mocking gesture while cooing.

Her response was a screech that garnered the attention of the other vendors and the nearby dock workers, “How dare you?! You dumb bird!” She stood from the ground on quaking legs to tower over Marco as he tried to act disinterested, “I knew we should have just cooked you when we found you two. You should be grateful I didn’t baste you in your sleep.”

Marco flapped his wings slightly while watching something in the ocean lined distance. He was putting on his best show of being a ‘dumb bird’ after all.

Usopp yelped when she lunged for the both of them and scrambled to pull Marco along in his retreat. Marco, however, stayed firm and refused to move under the boy’s shaking grip. Megin grabbed the material at the top of his hood while she smugly exclaimed, “Let’s see how you like it on a rotisserie, Tori-san.” The last word was drawn out into a haughty laugh.

“Hey lady, back off,” the vendor finally intervened. “You’re causing trouble for this kid.”

Megin’s head shot up while Marco took the chance to bite her in the hand. She threw herself away from the pain and stumbled back. The fresh mark on her hand flashed an aggressive red as she cradled it in her uninjured one. The scowl she sent Marco’s way would have been enough to kill a lesser person, but since Marco was a bird he chose to ignore it in favour of spitting the foreign blood out of his mouth.

The vendor chuckled lightly, “See, even the bird don’t like you.”

“Shove it old man,” Megin spat, still focusing on her hand. She took a step back, “You just wait until Fidio gets here.” Then another step, “He’ll fix all of you, put you in your places.”

“I’m fine right here thank you,” the vendor joked in a tone that mimicked her earlier superiority. “But I think you best find that friend of yours. Wouldn’t want that hand getting infected.”

Megin tisked under her breath before slinking away. Marco watched her go until she turned into an alley further down the dock. He had to squish the urge to chase after her; as much as he would have liked to put his claws to good use, his legs gave another harsh protest.

He checked the cloak before turning to Usopp. He was met with the boy’s attentive gaze and the question, “Are you alright Tori-san? Did she hurt you anywhere?” Marco shook his head as if to shake off the other’s concern. He didn’t expect the sudden impact to his chest.

The warmth that blossomed in the area when Usopp sniffled into the cloak’s fabric could have been from the mucus, that Marco didn’t want to think too much about, coming out of the boy’s nose as he pressed further into his chest or the beating of his adrenaline fueled heart, maybe it was from something else entirely; Marco couldn’t find it in himself to care much. Knowing that reciprocating the hug would render the disguise moot, he craned his neck to rest his chin on top of Usopp’s head while he worked through whatever emotions had clearly overwhelmed him during that confrontation.

Between the hushed muttering being pressed into his chest by Usopp, as if he was trying to force the words into Marco’s heart and lungs, and the rhythmic thumping of said heart, Marco was surprised he heard the grumbled question from the fish stand vendor, “Bloody sailors, thinking they own the place. You alright there lad? She didn’t scare you with that entire routine, did she?”

Usopp shook his head.

Marco decided not to ponder the large puddle now forming on the front of his cloak. Kids did gross things sometimes; it was all good in his book, nothing to grimace internally about.

“That’s good…” The vendor sighed with a grimace. He awkwardly chuckled when Usopp finally stepped back to take deep breaths and wiped his nose on his arm. Then he offered, “Here I’ve got some napkins you can use.”

Marco cooed to get Usopp’s attention after the exchange. The latter blew his nose while turning towards him and meekly apologised, “Sorry Tori-san. You didn’t have to save me like that. She really could have eaten you.” The response to that was a knock on the side of the head from Marco’s beak. Usopp threw his hands up to shield himself, “Sorry, sorry! I don’t think you’d taste good either.”

Marco huffed.

Of course he wouldn’t.

Then Usopp cried out, “Oh no, your disguise!” He began to dab at the waterproof fabric in frantic motions while mumbling more apologies.

The vendor laughed at them and Marco had to admit he could find amusement out of the situation too. The small titter he made caused Usopp’s hand to still as he looked up to see Marco’s amused expression. His large blinking eyes and nervous demeanour reminded Marco of a fawn that had just learned to walk.

Something on his face must have betrayed that thought as Usopp began to lightly beat against his chest while he complained, “Don’t make fun of me. At least I’d taste good if someone roasted me, you stupid bird.” Marco tittered once more and placed his head on top of Usopp’s, forcing him to stop his weak assault. The boy huffed before surrendering to the embrace halfheartedly.

Marco was really starting to get used to these small moments between them. They were times laced by a feeling of care and concern that he usually reserved for his family. He wondered if he’d be able to hug Usopp properly when he got his powers back; that would be nice.

“You sure got a weird friend there kid,” the vendor commented in an offhand way. It was enough to break the moment.

Marco made a small sound of disappointment, one akin to a tsk, while Usopp adamantly refuted the man’s claim, “Tori-san’s not weird. He's eccentric, that’s all…”

Usopp then proceeded to go on an unrehearsed rant about how amazing Marco was. Despite the impromptu nature of the talk, the words seemed to be familiar on the boy’s tongue. Most of the time Marco wouldn’t feel the sense of dread crawling across his feathers at the realisation of someone singing his praises; however, given their previous company, Marco cast another glance towards the alley that Migen had entered merely minutes before. The normalcy of the moment and setting only helped to stir the unease turning his inner fire to ice.

\---

“I’m sorry lad but your pet will have to sleep outside if you want a room here,” the innkeeper apologised in a gruff tone.

The man was rough looking and tall. Usopp had to tilt his head up at an awkward angle to meet his eyes over the inn’s check-in desk. Tori-san, who was standing a couple feet away glancing about the room, made a noise of annoyance which mirrored Usopp’s defeated sigh.

This was the sixth place they had tried after they finished shopping for the day. Each time they had been turned away on account of how big Tori-san was and how much damage a ‘strange animal’ might cause in an enclosed space like a hotel room. Usopp had tried to explain how docile the bird was, something which garnered many exasperated noises from his friend, but had been rebuffed by the staff at every inn.

Their last hope had been this place; it had been recommended by a woman who had seen them leaving the last inn while Usopp tried to console Tori-san, who was rather placate given how he wouldn’t stop glaring at the innkeeper of the last place as Usopp had gently coaxed him to the exit.

The innkeeper cast him an apologetic frown before he offered, “You seem like a good kid, and I’d hate to put you in a difficult spot. How about you set up camp out back and we’ll serve you two breakfast in the morning, free of charge?”

“Really?” Usopp asked without any thought. He leaned further onto the desk, bouncing on the balls of his feet, to get a better look at the man’s face. The innkeeper seemed to be telling the truth, meaning his offer was genuine, and Usopp felt a warm, tingly bubbling up in the pit of his stomach. When the man chuckled with a nod, the sensation blossomed like a flowerbud in late spring.

After the merchants, Usopp wasn’t sure about people’s willingness to help them without the circumstances being terrible. Yet, negativity wouldn’t get him anywhere with someone depending on him; Tori-san couldn’t talk or use money or fly (something which was going to change soon if everything went smoothly) so Usopp had to take care of him. 

Maybe not ‘take care of’ but he could at least do the stuff that Tori-san couldn’t while his friend did the same for him. That sounded fair. 

Usopp felt strange having someone depend on him. He was in no way the strongest or smartest or fastest, and certainly not the bravest, person in the world; he was just Usopp. However, being himself had gotten them this far and Tori-san was going to be good as new and himself soon too. They’d be an unstoppable team!

If Tori-san wanted to stay, at least…

The enthusiasm drained out of him like water out of a leaky bucket. What would Tori-san do when his wing was healed? What did Tori-san think of him? What was Tori-san thinking now?

Usopp glanced over at him, faking a positive attitude in a way that made his smile feel like it was glued in place and his heart was made of tar, and asked, “What do you think Tori-san? Want to camp out?”

Tori-san answered with a slow nod, after giving the innkeeper a few up and down glances, while glowering at the man behind the desk.

“Alright! That means you also get to taste my amazing cooking again,” Usopp tried to joke, both to alleviate the creaky tension in his legs and to save the poor innkeeper from the bird’s wrath.

He got a mirthful sigh for his trouble.

“I’m basically professionally trained. My mom is the best cook in the world after all,” he explained with a few flourishes of his shaky hands. Some small part of his brain noticed that some of the movements he had been doing were reserved for his stories (his lies); his mom’s cooking was the best he’d ever eaten so how was he lying? Usopp thought over his actions while flexing his hands in the material of his overalls. There wasn’t a day that went by that he didn’t want to eat her freshly made bread or this soup that she’d always promise to teach him how to make when she got better…

Then she never did.

She was the best cook in the world after all. She had to keep some things secret from him, otherwise they wouldn’t be special anymore.

Usopp’s hands stilled at his sides. His fingers gripped the fabric against his sides as a shaky breath rattled past his quivering lips. Should he have felt his own breath on his teeth that much? How come his tongue was so heavy all of a sudden? Was his heart beat supposed to be that loud?

Why did she have to leave?

Then there was a gentle touch that brushed across the exposed skin of his arm. The sensation was like a shot of lightning in a tornado; it cut through the molasses coated stream of his consciousness as a hot knife through warm butter to leave those unwanted thoughts to sizzle away against the overheated surface of his skull.

Usopp blinked away the stinging in his eyes before braving Tori-san’s unsure gaze. The contact was made more solid on his upper arm as the bird sent him a questioning coo. While the feathery tickle on Tori-san’s fabric covered wing tip was a rock, in a moment where Usopp’s thoughts were being held back by a poorly constructed dam, it also highlighted how much the boy was shaking. It felt like every one of his nerves were smoldering, with a subtle itch that covered his entire body, and that his bones were trying to melt under his skin; they couldn’t actually do that, right!?

“I’m fine… Just thinking about something,” Usopp lied. He cringed at how dry his throat felt around the mumbled words.

Tori-san looked stern. He was probably the smartest bird in the world, but that wasn’t saying much given how weak Usopp’s evasion had been.

Why couldn’t he lie to Tori-san? He had lied to everyone in Syrup Village everyday like it was nothing, but he felt sick whenever he saw the bird worrying about him - every time he saw past Usopp’s tales and got a clearer image of the tired, lonely boy underneath his momentary happiness.

Still, Tori-san dropped the subject to push them towards following the innkeeper to the inn’s backdoor. Usopp’s legs carried him through the journey in robotic motions to stop his knees from locking underneath him and send him crashing to the floor in the pitiful heap he never wanted his friend to see him as.

“Here it is lad,” the innkeeper announced as they stepped out into a small patch of grass enclosed by a short wooden fence. The lawn was well maintained, lovingly manicured, with a view of the forest that stretched out behind the building. It was a shady spot, even in the early evening tangerine coloured light, but that meant they could lie in after sunrise. He sighed, “It’s not much but it’s a lot safer than the street, if you ask me.”

“This is great,” Usopp encouraged while he glanced about the space with wide eyes. The earth was soft beneath his feet, perfect to sleep on, and the trees would provide enough wood for a fire. He felt his energy returning in a momentary burst of ideas. “Thank you for your hospitality,” he bowed slightly to the man.

The man chuckled, “No problem. Just holler if you have any trouble, I’ll come running with me gun.” With that, he left them alone.

Usopp let out a relieved breath while turning to the garden proper. He put his balled up fists on his hips with the brightest grin he could muster. Without glancing towards Tori-san, he suggested, “We should get started. It’ll be dark soon and who knows what dangerous things are lurking in the night.” Usopp laughed at his own attempt at something one of the grownups in Syrup called ‘dark humour’, he didn’t get it but maybe Tori-san would. He dropped his bag onto the soft grass, satisfied that nothing sounded broken when it made contact, before adding, “Not that any monster could scare me.”

He was about to rummage through his bag for their new tent, a needed replacement due to Tori-san’s new cape, when a weight softly landed on his head. Usopp’s spine went straight as he reflexively jumped and the object that rested on him made an annoyed noise. 

It was Tori-san. What else would it be, other than Tori-san?

Usopp felt kind of silly while he stood totally still under his friend’s chin. Not knowing what else to do, he meekly asked, “Tori-san? You okay up there?”

There was a coo. It was a curious, soothing tone. It held all of the questions that Tori-san wanted to ask Usopp and some of the questions Usopp wanted to ask himself; then it acted as an offered hand of reassurance for whatever answer retched itself from the dark, sickly confines of Usopp’s affection starved heart. That affection was then physically given by the uncovered wings that moved to wrap around him, like a cocoon made from the morning sky. 

Usopp found himself surrounded by warmth and comfort in a moment when he wanted nothing more than to ignore the negativity slithering its way through each solitary fibre of his being. He didn’t want to acknowledge how unordinary being shown any amount of positive attention felt to him. Any consideration towards the life he had sworn to leave behind in Syrup Village, the life of a scared little boy caught between the shadow and light of his short existence, would surely be the thing to break any semblance of emotional control he had tacked together mere moments before.

Are you okay?

That was the question that Tori-san was trying to ask, it was obvious. It was too bad that Usopp didn’t have an answer to give him.

Was he alright? No. Yes. Maybe.

Did the answer even matter?

He didn’t need to be okay to function. Misery could fuel a person’s actions just as well as happiness. Usopp wasn’t exactly sure if he was ‘miserable’ but he definitely couldn’t describe himself as ‘happy’ either. Was there something in the middle? Was there a way to summarise the rapid fluctuations of his shaky demeanor while he tried to hold himself together like every grown up had wanted him to back in Syrup?

How could there be a single word for the way his entire world had shattered around him when his mother left him and people had expected a child, him, to pick up the pieces with already bleeding hands and knees scraped from clawing towards an unreachable dream? Why did such a word exist and why didn’t he know it? Was it because he was just a stupid kid with big dreams in an even bigger ocean chasing after a silhouette that seemed to obliviously dance further from his tear stained heart?

Another coo and the hug deepened; both pulled Usopp from his thoughts and into the fuzzy, blanketing embers of Tori-san’s feathers. It was like he was trying to protect Usopp from the inside of his own head, a bird shaped shield against the venomous whispers that maliciously giggled onto the innermost side of his eardrums. Tori-san was trying his hardest to keep him away from an enemy of Usopp’s own making, one that had long since been his lone companion amongst the myriad of familiar faces of his only home, and who was he to tell his friend that it wasn’t working?

His inner thoughts scurried away when the bird came into view, as if Tori-san was a dangerous predator. The worries that had once plagued his every thought quieted to an unnoticed murmur in light of the joy that his friend had brought into his life. The days spent on their little adventure were the first time in a long while where Usopp didn’t feel himself teetering on the precipice of an inescapable chasm.

“Hey, Tori-san?” Usopp mumbled, despite knowing the sound would be muffled by the wing feathers pressed into his face.

A questioning coo was the answer this time.

“Do you want to hear more of that story tonight? The next part will be really good, I promise…” His voice grew smaller as the words fell from his numb tongue. It felt like a thousand bees stung the inside of his mouth before travelling to buzz erratically behind his eyes.

Usopp was snuggled into again before being released with a sound of agreement. He turned to look Tori-san in the eyes, the height difference between them being enough to force Usopp’s head up at an awkward angle, and found sympathy clearly shining in them. There was also a layer of apprehension, over what Usopp wasn’t sure.

Tori-san was the one to end the staring contest by craning his head in an attempt to wiggle out of the cape fastenings. Usopp blinked at his actions for a few moments before he offered to help, a choice greatly appreciated by the struggling bird.

It didn’t take long to set up their camp site. 

The cobalt sky above them was quick to make itself known as the only light they had by the time their fire was made was that of said flame and the waning moon. The garden was cast in a mysterious mixture of gold and silver that rippled like the waves of a pond with the night’s darkness. Their campfire was going strong, having been built up from a singular sunshine ember, with their food cooking on one of Usopp’s apparatuses. 

The sizzle of frying food that sang in a melodious harmony alongside the crackle of the gently burning wood could have acted as a lullaby if he didn’t feel like his nerves were also being singed in the, otherwise comforting, heat of the fire. Usopp poked at the vegetable filled pan for what could have been the millionth time as he stalled the conversation he had promised. Tori-san patiently waited behind him, silently accepting his role as a pillow when Usopp defeatedly settled into his side, before poking him in the cheek with his beak.

“I know, I know. Just letting the suspense set in,” Usopp waved him off with a smile. He took a deep breath, the heat soaked air filling his lungs like a hot iron rod in an ice bucket, in preparation for the wavering exhale.

“So… The Princess and the Star Bird made a vow to stick together until they found every constellation past the horizon and returned to the moon. A perfect pair of friends, going on the adventure of their lives…”

That sounds nice, like Tori-san and him.

“And they stuck to their word. They fought off dangerous enemies like a band of Space Beasts and their evil masters The Star Stealer Duo!”

He expected Tori-san to laugh at that one. Usopp glanced at him out of the corner of his eye to find the bird waiting for him to continue. He went along with the urge to snap his attention away from the considerate look. Then he went on a little less certain than before.

“The Duo were the ones who had stolen the constellations. They wanted to use them as fuel for their ship but the Princess wouldn’t allow it. She tried everything to make them see the error of their villainous ways, but they decided to capture her instead...”

...like a bird in a cage.

Usopp wanted to add that but maybe the comparison would be an insult.

“They surrounded her and were ready to strike when the Star Bird used its magic power to blind them. The Duo stumbled around, unable to see, until they fell off the side of their ship into the sea beyond the horizon. Of course, it was too dark for them to find their way back to their ship and so the Princess and the Star Bird ran away with it.”

He knew that stealing was wrong, so maybe having the heroes of his story do it was weird. Pirates took things without asking, it was called pillaging if he remembered correctly; did his dad pillage people?

Was his dad a hero who stole things too?

Casting that thought away for later, Usopp put his story on pause to ask, “Tori-san, is it wrong for pirates to steal?”

Tori-san jolted minutely against his back. The bird let out a sound that was somewhere between hesitant and guilty, what was that about?

“I was just wondering, since my dad is a pirate and does it make him a bad person for taking from other people? Even if they’re bad guys?” Usopp clarified while looking up at the sky.

It had been a while since he had last spoken about his dad. It wasn’t that he disliked the man but something didn’t sit right in the pit of his stomach when thoughts about him crossed Usopp’s mind.

Tori-san seemed deep in thought. He’d definitely ruined the mood now.

“Sorry, shouldn’t have stopped like that,” Usopp muttered to bring the bird’s attention back to the matter at hand.

“The ship, which they named the Space Cruiser, sailed through the sky like a bullet towards the moon. On the way there, they released all of the constellations back into the night sky past the horizon. The trail they left behind them was like a sea of diamonds, all twinkling and merrily singing to each other, all the way to the bright ball in the sky.” He cheered while pointing to the crescent moon above them.

Tori-san shifted behind him to follow the gesture. He made a soft coo, content to follow along. They both watched the sky for the next part of the story.

“When they made it home they expected parades and parties waiting for them, since the moon always had a party going, but no one was there. Instead, the moon kingdom was quiet and dark and cold. They were the only ones there, they were alone.”

Usopp tossed the word ‘alone’ around his head, testing the two syllable adjective as many times as he could before it went stale in his thought process. It was strange how such a short word could be used in a wide range of situations; being alone was neither a positive nor a negative thing without context but Usopp thought the word sounded sad. Not phonetically at least, it was kind of miserable that a single word could do so much while also having one meaning, as if it had a million friends but none of them stayed long enough for it to matter.

To be ‘alone’ was to be lonely.

“Then they found the grave of the kingdom’s Queen.”

Tori-san’s gaze moved away from the sky and onto him. Usopp felt his eyes on his skin and staring into his soul, even though he was laying it out already.

“She had died of loneliness. The Queen had mourned the loss of her daughter and the King gathered the people of the kingdom for a great journey to find them. None of them had thought to bring her along, maybe she was too sad to make the voyage exciting. So the Queen waved them off with a smile. She just didn’t realise that they were sent in the opposite direction to her daughter, away from the horizon and further into the sky.”

Was the King being selfish to his wife by leaving her alone? Maybe he had planned to bring back their daughter? Maybe he had secretly wanted to live another life, one at sea, while his wife and child were left behind?

“The Princess wept at her mother’s grave. Her tears were made from star light that brought a silver glow to the moon. She cried every night when the kingdom was supposed to be full of happiness and wonder and people, not simply her and the Star Bird. Eventually her friend grew angry at the sight of her sadness and made a vow to bring back the people so they could all be happy again, despite their loss.”

They promised to stay together forever afterall. Usopp wondered if Tori-san had people that he would fly to the ends of the world for, was being away from them hurting him?

“That’s why the moon changes shape, since the Princess can’t cry the same amount of tears every night. And it’s why we see shooting stars, that’s the Star Bird trying to find the lost moon people and their King.”

Was Usopp stealing Tori-san away from his family while they were together? Was he being a bad person?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I hope you all liked it.
> 
> That last scene was super hard to write without crying a little bit. Do I like making Usopp sad? I have no idea anymore.
> 
> Do comment and tell me what you think.
> 
> Until next time!


	6. Declaration of Bonds

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A calm night that spells near disaster for the future.
> 
> With a future then left full of uncertainty for both Marco and Usopp.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Otherwise known as: sh*t hits the fan part 1
> 
> FIGHT SCENE (but not really). Please mind the new tags added to the fic, they relate to this chapter especially - I don't want anybody walking into something they are not ready for.

Marco wondered if he was soft. Not emotionally soft, he thought about how his feathers felt to someone other than himself. Usopp always seemed comfortable when he relaxed into the plumage on his side, over his uninjured wing and the cerulean fire that flickered across the rest of his middle. Sure, he was being used as a living pillow but who was he to complain when the boy fell asleep on him in a moment of vulnerability and trust.

At a surface level, Usopp was a kid who was oblivious to the ways of the world to the point he trusted people with his safety too quickly for Marco’s liking. Yet, there were clear walls around some parts of Usopp’s life so thick they may as well have been made of reinforced steel. Summing them up as parental issues would be doing them an injustice.

Usopp finally mentioned his dad…

Marco knew plenty of pirates who had left behind families to go to sea. Many of them, if not all, lamented over the counters of countless bars about how much they missed them and counting the days between the visits some of them schedules. Pops had always been understanding when crewmen asked for solo shore leave or a change in their course to visit a specific island, any family of a crewman was his family too after all. Yet, Marco understood that not every crew had that luxury, so many of them tried to send letters during their journeys instead though.

It was clear something had happened to Usopp’s mom but what had his dad done to cause him to leave home, most likely in search of him, and travel away from the safety of an island? Who was his dad? Did Marco know him?

None of these questions would get answered without his voice so Marco chose to put them away for later use. He could, however, answer an internal query of his own. Marco knew that he would do everything in his power to find Usopp’s dad, if he was still alive and kicking, and punch him in the face. It was one thing to set out to sea and leave behind a family, it was an entirely different ball park to leave your kid alone to set out to sea. 

Was it unfair to dislike someone he may not have met? Of course. Did Marco care? Not really…

He sighed. Stewing over fictional plans of petty revenge was counterproductive to his current short term goal: joining Usopp in the realm of blissful sleep. Marco lifted his head from the tarp covered grass beneath him to peak at the boy pressed into his side. He readjusted the blanket that lay over them both so that it came up to Usopp’s chin, rewarded by a soft mumble for his efforts, before he settled back on to the tarp.

It was odd that they had set up a tent but had chosen the lazy option of sleeping in a pile. Marco wasn’t going to complain about anything, camping underneath the stars was more whimsical anyway, aside from the fact that the tarp crinkled at the slightest movement - it was like sleeping on a rice cracker. The light, fresh breeze that carried the scent of fresh dew and wheatgrass created a gentle brushing across his feathers that seemed to be set on leading him to the land of dreams. Lingering heat from the campfire’s ashes added a layer of warmth to the air that acted as an additional blanket to the rest of the night.

The sound of a distant cricket had been whitenoise for a large part of the evening, alongside the breeze, and was quiet enough not to impede his ability to relax into a bird-shaped puddle on the tarp. Sleep sounded nice. Marco closed his eyes to take in the additional sounds of the night’s symphony that he had yet to notice. The whispered shifting of foliage in the wind, nocturnal animals chattering amongst the trees, Usopp’s unconscious mumbles that were totally indecipherable, all of these tones played in unison until the distinct sound of footfalls upon grass broke the night’s song.

Marco’s body became fully awake at the realisation that the sound was growing closer. He tensed, mindful of the body resting on top of his own, and twisted his neck to catch a pair of figures dart behind a thicker set of trees.

Shit. Shit. Shit.

Losing sight of an opponent during a battle full of already unknown variables was a sure fire way to get killed.

He attempted to soundlessly sit up from the tarp but was stopped by a firm tug on his side. Marco looked over at Usopp as he sleepily grasped at his feathers, a clear signal of the boy wanting him to stay. Now, if they were in any other situation - i.e. not possibly mortal peril - Marco would have taken the time to be endeared by the instinctual action of subtle affection. However, he also didn’t trust the two people watching them from the darkness like predators waiting to strike an injured deer. With a fleeting reluctance, he fluffed up his wing into Usopp’s face and he let go to swat away the offending appendage.

The satisfaction from his plan working left Marco when the steps from earlier returned to take him running from behind. He didn’t have to process the movement as his leg swung out in an arching kick into the side of the attacker. There was a thump when they hit the ground beside the tarp, less than a meter away from the still sleeping boy.

Marco turned fully to take in the sight of the attacker. It was Megin, clearly acting upon her earlier threat of revenge; she laid on the ground clutching at her side with a small grimace, frustration painted on her features, “You little shit.” If Usopp had been awake, he might have hit her for that but, since he wasn’t, Marco chose to titter at the colourful insult.

His amusement was broken to another set of feet making their way towards them. Fidio, owner of said feet, stood at the garden’s fence. He clapped his hands slowly while his comrade picked herself up from the ground. The smug expression he wore and the condescending lilt of his voice as he commented put Marco on edge, “Bravo. That was very impressive sir. Well worth the wait to meet you,Tori-san.” Marco narrowed his eyes as the man’s grin grew malicious, “Or should I call you by your official title? Marco the Phoenix.”

Fidio gracefully stepped over the short fence with a single bound, as if it had not been there at all, as he went on, “I wasn’t surprised when you didn’t show your face on our boat. Of course, it was very rude of you but what can you expect from a dirty pirate, even one as esteemed as yourself?” He chuckled at his own joke, the underhandedness of the comment not lost on Marco, “For such a fearsome man to be reduced to a pretty bird that could fetch an even prettier penny among our very willing buyers, it’s almost comical.”

At the raising of Fidio’s voice, Usopp stirred in his sleep and murmured a barely heard complaint. The man’s eye shot to the boy before his smile developed a knowing curl and he whispered, “Does he know? That you’re a thieving pirate, a bad person like his father.”

Marco wanted to yell at the man. He was sick of swallowing his pride for the sake of laying low around these assholes. The life of a pirate could be one of great evil, he would admit to that, but that didn’t mean that pirates couldn’t have their own moral code. The Whitebeard Pirates had taken down some real assholes over the years, people who had no qualms with slaughtering entire villages for the sake of monetary gains, and he had no doubts that he would make sure that the two jokers in front of him would be added to that list.

His blood turned hot when Migen chose that moment to ask, “Hey Fids, I know we’re flipping the bird to the boss but can we keep the kid? He’s fun and, who knows, I’ve met some guys who have weird tastes that might like him too.”

His brain once again took a back seat to the adrenaline now fueling his body; Marco threw himself towards the woman. His head made contact with her gut as he barrelled into her and knocked both of them to the ground. 

Migen shrieked when razor sharp claws began to scratch at any part of her they could reach. Marco refused to acknowledge the burning sensation that ripped from his leg to his injured wing; he could only concentrate on rendering the body underneath his claw incapable of movement for the foreseeable future.

The sounds of ripping fabric, skin and earth as the pair struggled against one another’s push and pull was ended by the deafening echo of a gun being cocked outside of Marco’s field of vision. All movement ceased, even the air seemed to be holding its breath. A pin drop could have been heard in the silence as Marco chanced a look towards the source of the sound. The claw he had around Migen’s neck tightened minutely when he caught the flash of metal pressed into the side of Usopp’s head.

Fidio’s hand shook as he yelled out his order, frantic energy lacing his every action, “Let her go you, you, you overhyped piece of shit! Get off her or I’ll blow this dumb brat’s brains out.”

Usopp, despite the fact that he was shaking like a leaf in a hurricane, managed to placate, “H-hey now, let’s not d-do anything drastic. I like having a brain.”

That comment earned him a smack with the barrel of the pistol. Marco mirrored the hiss the boy made while tightening his grip to the point his claws broke skin. They were small nicks that bled out sluggishly past his claws and onto the dirt beneath them, turning it into coppery mud. A hand came up to grasp at his leg which caused him to look away from the scumbag testing his patience.

He stared uncaringly at the woman in his grasp as she shrieked, “You heard him! Lemme go!” His claws twitched, “No! Please don’t kill me! I’ll do anything!”

“Shut up, you idiot! The boss already took care of his Devil Fruit powers, so just push him off,” Fidio ordered. Marco scowled at the both of them. They just had to work for that sack of shit, scum keep similar company after all. That meant that trouble was following him like a bloodhound. When Migen went to follow Fidio’s orders, he gave her neck another squeeze in warning. 

Then, after she went still again, he tilted his head to meet Usopp’s wide eyes. The glassy stare told him enough; he needed to end this and fast. Before he could do anything, Usopp looked away. When Marco trailed after his gaze towards the still smouldering ashes of the fire an idea struck him.

Smart kid.

The next few moments felt like a lifetime. Marco made good on his non-verbal threat and sank his claws into Migen’s throat with just enough force for her to start screaming, which wasn’t much in the end. He tore himself away from her to kick the embers into Fidio’s face before the man could react. This left both of the merchants on the ground writhing in pain, their vocalisations of agony echoing into the forest around them.

Usopp scrambled away from the man to crouch behind Marco, who stood over the pair with his hackles raised. He must have been too shocked to take notice of the crimson painting most of Marco’s lower body as he clutched at his tail feathers like his life depended on maintaining the contact.

His plan worked when the inn’s back door slammed into the building’s back wall and the innkeeper came out with a shotgun. The man took one look at the scene before pointing the weapon at the newly recovered Fidio and bellowed, “Who the fuck are you and what are you doing on my land?”

All prior confidence drained from the man at the end of the barrel. He stammered some kind of excuse but was forced to stop under the innkeeper’s increasingly angered gaze. Then he dropped to the ground and begged, “Please spare us! We’re just merchants that got lost and this feral bird attacked us!”

Marco didn’t hold back the growl as he took a threatening step towards the sniveling weasel.

Feral, huh?

“Tori-san didn’t do anything wrong!” Usopp countered. He stood shaking, still gripping Marco’s golden tails, as everyone in the garden turned to him, “You guys came to kidnap us and sell him.”

“Don’t lie, little boy. Why would we do that?” Fidio tried to joke with a weak smile.

“Because you’re bad people! Bad people that want to make money out of my friend and give me to weird men!” Usopp sobbed as the fear from earlier gave way to an exhausting rush of emotions. Marco wanted to shield him from the stares while the boy broke down onto the ground. His tears were unimpeded and soaked into the dirt beneath them in dull droplets. The sobs that bubbled up his throat were knives to Marco’s ears.

This was his fault. This entire mess was his fucking fault; if he had just confronted the pair earlier then-

“Alright! That’s it!” The innkeeper had heard enough and pressed the end of the gun into Fidio’s forehead. “Give me one good reason to not put a bullet through this here skull of yours?”

“I-I-I-” Fidio stammered, swallowing around the lump in his throat, until the innkeeper hit him with the gun. He crumpled to the ground. Migen had already passed out, probably due to shock, so the two of them made a pair.

The innkeeper sighed. He ran a hand down his face while muttering, “I’m getting too old for this…”

Marco ignored him in favour of consoling the boy holding onto him. Usopp shifted his grip to wrap arms around his neck in a hug that could be easily compared to a choke hold. The strength put into the action was surprising for someone so small; yet, Marco gently returned the gesture with his uninjured wing. The boy in his grasp shivered as though they were in arctic winds; his entire body was a spring waiting to snap under the smallest amount of additional pressure.

Marco led him towards their tarp before Usopp’s knees buckled and he slipped gracelessly to the floor. After nudging him into a better sitting position, he placed a blanket across Usopp’s shoulders, adjusting it with his beak until it was wrapped around the boy properly.

There were no words exchanged during this entire process. Neither of them wanted to shatter the fragility of the moment. 

Instead of talking, Marco sat behind Usopp so he could be used as a pillow. It was a close match to their positions before the evening had gone cartwheeling down a hill. He stayed as still as he could while Usopp decided his own course of action. Marco wouldn’t blame him if he chose to shy away from him, he was still covered in dry blood in some places, and squashed down the urge to drag the boy against his side and force him to ease the visible tension from his rattling spine.

Marco knew something had changed between them. This encounter had shaken something already unstable within Usopp and Marco didn’t know which pieces of it he could pick up again for him, if any. He wondered if Usopp would want to stay away from him, since the kidnapping attempt was because of his actions alone. 

That thought was a bucket of ice water to his heart.

How close were they at this point?

Marco’s life at sea had been defined by an extended family, one where blood relations didn’t matter in the definition of the word or the emotions involved, that grew on Pops’ whims. He loved every single one of his brothers, he would do anything for them, so Marco could clearly say that family was the most important thing to him.

Did he see Usopp as part of that family?

He’d be lying to himself if he said anything other than ‘absolutely’. Marco wanted more than just a single adventure for the boy; a chance to help him follow whatever wild dreams he was chasing after. Usopp was clumsy, emotional, loud, sporadic, but he also had a large heart that was full of more bravery than he had seen from a lot of grown men. He would bet a year's worth of his shore leave spending on that fact that Usopp could benefit from being around a group of people that supported him wholeheartedly in his life, people like his crew and Pops.

When the moment finally came for Usopp to make, none too gentle, contact with his side Marco didn’t think twice about shifting into a position to essentially cradle the boy. Usopp showed no signs of minding the change; if anything, he allowed Marco to tenderly coax him to lie deep within the crook of his wing, surrounding him on all sides with a wall of sky blue fire.

Neither of them moved for the rest of the night; even after the innkeeper insisted they sleep in a storeroom for their safety, Marco refused to move the sleeping boy. Not only did the boy deserve the rest, Usopp deserved all of the care and attention Marco was going to shower him with when day broke the next morning.

That was a fact and a promise - a contract made under the night’s watching stars.

\---

Breakfast was toast. Plain toast, nothing more and nothing less; even that had been too much for his frazzled self, it was like sandpaper against his cheeks and throat, rubbing his insides raw.

Usopp sighed at the memory of the singular swallow he had managed that morning at the inn’s dining table. He rubbed at his throat while his stomach gave a growl in protest. Maybe Tori-san had been right in his attempt to make him eat more. Heck, Usopp had been worried that he was going to be fed like a baby chick by the stern expression his friend had pinned him with when he refused to take another bite.

Speaking of Tori-san, Usopp left his melancholic short term reminiscing to take in his current situation. His friend walked silently at his side as they made their way down the port town’s main street. Tori-san, despite his attentiveness at the inn, had been distractedly surveying the buildings around them since they left that morning.

Usopp decided to leave him to it and blocked out as much of the noise around them as he could while returning to his thoughts. The hustle and bustle of the street market, which had seemed so exciting to him the day before, made his ears tingle unpleasantly; walking past every conversation was like running his brain along sandpaper until his thoughts were nothing but a smooth, nauseating monotone. Should his ears be ringing?

That toast from earlier might be coming back for a visit soon... 

Before he could force his stomach to settle, Tori-san promptly pulled him to the side by the strap of his overalls. Usopp hopped behind him, failing to adjust to the sudden change in direction, while he flailed and panicked, “W-what? I wasn’t going to throw up, I swear.”

The hold on his overalls was dropped in the moment before Tori-san turned towards him. Usopp answered the silent question of ‘what did you say’ that the bird shot his way with a look, “Sorry, I’m still not feeling too good… You don’t have to worry though.”

His voice was quiet and childish, neither characteristic helping his case; Tori-san definitely didn’t believe the obvious lie but, instead of prodding more for answers that Usopp knew would make the knot in his stomach get tighter, he flashed him a sympathetic glance and gestured in the direction they had been travelling in. There was no insistence in the action, just a suggestion of movement. 

Usopp peeked out around the bird’s body to catch a glimpse of their destination. It was an average looking book shop; the large display window out front was neatly organised to show, what he suspected to be, the latest releases and popular titles in the foreground of the rest of the shadowy shop. An average bespeckled man exited the shop holding a large pile of books while an identical man held the door open. 

When the former left, the man in the doorway glanced around until he caught Usopp’s staring and gave him a warm smile, along with a short wave. Usopp dumbfoundedly returned the greeting. Tori-san used his wing to urge him forward, a piece of gentle contact that thankfully didn’t affect his internal condition, towards the merry man as he greeted, “Well hello there young man, haven’t seen you around here before, from out of town are you?”

Usopp was slightly thrown off by his fast paced manner of speaking, it was as if the man’s voice was trying to outpace the speed of sound, but Tori-san took it in stride by nodding. The man acted taken aback for a moment before righting himself with a comment, “He’s a smart one, ain’t he? Is he trained or like that naturally?”

“Tori-san’s just like that,” Usopp answered with a small proud smile.

Tori-san was really smart. The bird was amazing in more ways than Usopp could count, on all of his fingers - maybe even on the fingers of the entire village. He was fiery, brave and wise; all of the things Usopp wasn’t with his meekness and limbs that had a tendency to give up when the going got tough, like if he was being held at gunpoint.

Why hadn’t he been able to do anything?

Tori-san had taken down a grown man and woman by himself. The fight, if it could even be called that, had been over in seconds; sure, the innkeeper had been the one to call the local law enforcers but it was Tori-san’s plan that had saved their skin, he’d even been able to include Usopp’s dumb suggestion of using the fire ashes in the escape. He kept his cool in a life or death situation like a superhero, could birds be superheroes?

“So lad, what brings you here today? Looking for a nice read, I’ve got lots of books with pictures,” the store owner jokily suggested.

“Um…” Usopp trailed off, lips pursed, as he looked to his friend for the answer.

His question was answered with a shake of Tori-san’s head.

“Oh,” the sound was drawn out by the man. He then motioned them inside the shop and suggested, “How about you two have a wander around and tell me if you need anything.” Tori-san, it seems, didn’t need to be told twice as he stepped across the threshold with a determined gait. Usopp made a move to follow but fell short of taking a step forward when the owner added, “You were involved in that fuss at Sempo’s last night, weren’t you?”

The blood in Usopp’s veins turned to ice. How did this random stranger know? The port town wasn’t small by any means, but that didn’t mean that word wouldn’t travel fast between the right people (some town gossips were incredibly skilled in their art of the petty whispers); the fact that someone had openly asked meant that everyone could already know and might be judging them right now.

Maybe they would take Tori-san away because he almost killed Megin. He wouldn’t actually kill anyone though, Usopp knew that.

“Yeah, my brother’s an officer up at the town’s jail. He’s got his hands full having to research all of these laws they keep pulling out of their asses about ‘false imprisonment’,” the owner explained in a sigh. He sounded tired. “But nothing you can do about folks like that, isn’t that right lad?”

“Like what?” Usopp blurted out, despite how much his nervous energy was spiking.

“Human traffickers, the bloody lot of them,” the man spat under his breath. His eyes darted about the street before he signalled for the boy to come inside.

Usopp complied. As soon as he entered, the door was closed behind him with a quiet click. The space was stuffy and felt smaller without the sea breeze trailing at his ankles; due to the apparent lack of air circulation, the shop smelled stale with a hint of what Usopp suspected to be mildew. His nose wrinkled, but he kept walking past the mountainous shelves piled high with leather bound books of every shape, size and colour.

“Now, let’s chat this over with a biscuit,” the owner informed with a grin.

“B-but…” He tried to spot Tori-san amongst the stacks while attempting to protest weakly.

“You sound like a smart kid, so I’m going to be honest with you...” he was ignored as the man pulled out a jar from behind the shop’s counter. The owner’s tone was still lighthearted. Usopp refused his offer of an off colour flat pastry, bright green biscuits didn’t sound like a good idea for his stomach, before he went on, “... The people who you ran into are pretty infamous around this stretch of sea. Word gets around you know.”

Usopp could only silently watch as the man nibbled on the strange food, speaking around his bites, “Nothing concrete, so they ain’t on here.” The owner rapped his knuckle on a cork board behind the counter. Usopp then noticed the myriad of wanted posters pinned on the wall, around a variety of other community type notices; most of them were old and faded, but the newer ones showed what he suspected to be big name pirates.

Something within him wanted to find his dad amongst those pictures. However, a much larger part of him fueled the decision to blink owlishly at the shop owner. Where was this going?

“Though I suspect your friend, Tori-san was it, knows all about it. They’re a slippery bunch so you and your friend are in a lot of danger, if they’ve got you in their sights,” the man explained in a grimmer tone than before. His cheery demeanour, however, barely changed in spite of the serious tone the conversation had steered itself into. Usopp gulped away the dryness in his throat to ask a question; only to have that opportunity taken by the man in front of him when he added darkly, “He’s in a dangerous spot lad, no other way to put it. People out there want to get ahold of him and wouldn’t hesitate to put you six feet under, kid or not.”

S-six feet under…

Was Tori-san going to die? 

Of course he wasn’t…

Right?

Usopp gripped the front of his overalls with shaky hands as he swallowed again. First he was useless to stop the people he cared about dying from enemies he couldn’t see; now, he had proven himself just as inadequate in a fight against things that he could see. Who was he to say whether or not Tori-san was safe when he had been the one to be protected as soon as things took a turn for the worst. He’d then spent the morning moping, feeling sorry for himself, while Tori-san had been the one to cheer him up - as if he hadn’t been in danger the night before too.

He felt so stupid, so goddamn useless.

After everything they had struggled through so far and Tori-san was going to be hunted down by more people like Fidio and Megin.

“So, that means you’ll have to protect him too, don’t it?” The owner asked firmly.

Usopp snapped out his thoughts, his hands in a vice grip with the material of his clothes, to catch the man’s steely eyes.

It did?

He wanted to voice that question, because he had definitely heard the man wrong; no one could possibly expect him to react any better than he had the evening before. Usopp had failed, quite spectacularly, at doing the one thing he had promised himself he would do - be there for Tori-san.

“You’re young, have your whole life ahead of you. That means you’ll want to spend that time with your family, won’t you?” Usopp listened to the man as he listed off all of the optimistic thoughts that had crossed his mind since he met Tori-san.

Tori-san was his family? Usopp pondered the answer to that for a moment.

Families were usually parents and their kids, like everyone back in his village, like him and his mom; they could also be siblings, cousins and grandparents, if he was being specific, but he and Tori-san were none of those things. So, why did the word sound so right when the shop owner said it?

“You seem uncertain, not chickening out are you?” The man’s tone was amused, which Usopp thought was a bit odd with the seriousness of the conversation and his own inner turmoil. Usopp frantically shook his head. 

“Good, good…” He grinned before taking another weird biscuit from his jar. “Now, I think your friend is waiting for you.”

Tori-san then stepped out from a nearby bookshelf. He stared the book shop owner down, caution clear in his stance and expression, while he walked towards the counter. Usopp silently watched the equally soundless exchange as the pair stared at each other. He wondered if he should step in, but was stopped when Tori-san turned his attention towards him in a questioning gesture.

‘Are you okay? Is he bothering you?’

Usopp shook his head and this seemed to satisfy whatever annoyance had overtaken the bird at that moment. Maybe he should have been the one to ask those questions to Tori-san; after all, Tori-san was quick to glare at the man when he chuckled, “Oh, don’t give me that look. Information is my job, you can’t expect me not to be a little curious about your little friend here.”

That earned the man what sounded like a scoff.

“You never did trust me much, did you? Some things aren’t meant to change, I suppose,” the owner joked lightheartedly. “I do like your new getup though.”

Tori-san fluffed out his wings at the mention of his appearance. It made Usopp wonder if the impromptu disguise was embarrassing for his friend to wear.

Oops.

“Anywho, I think I know what you’ve come in for today. Do correct me if I’m wrong though,” he mused as he rifled around under the counter between them. Tori-san huffed, rolling his shoulders, as if this was the standard routine for whatever prior relationship the pair had; Usopp wondered if he could ask about it when they left the shop, although by Tori-san’s reaction the pair weren’t exactly friends.

A roll of old looking paper was placed in front of them a moment later while the store owner stood over it with a smug grin. Tori-san tisked before delicately taking the offered object in his beak; he didn’t even check it which confused Usopp even more, what was going on?

Then they left.

Tori-san hurried him out the door as the owner called behind them, “Come again Bird Boy, and bring your kid too. He’s funnier than you.” Usopp tried to be polite and send the man a wave, but the wing pushing him out of the building was enough to give him second thoughts about the action.

When the door clicked closed, Usopp took stock of his friend’s demeanor. Tori-san seemed tired, his once tense stance dropped when the first lick of fresh air brushed past them, and frustrated as he worried his wings under his cloak. Usopp knew nervous energy when he saw it, he practically ran on it twenty-four-seven, so he didn’t stop himself from asking, “Did you know him, Tori-san?”

Tori-san’s grimace was enough of an answer.

Usopp giggled at his expression, which he tried and failed to stifle when Tori-san playfully bumped into him, and asked, “What did he give you then? A map?” 

He got a nod in response. 

“Does that mean you know where we’re going next?” He speculated with a hopeful inclination in his tone.

That, curiously, awarded him a shake of Tori-san head. Usopp was going to ask for an explanation but, instead, observed his friend pointing his concealing wing towards him before gesturing at the map. It took him a moment to understand the silent question being asked of him, but Usopp didn’t hesitate to ask for confirmation, “What? You want me to pick?”

When the reaction to his question was positive, Usopp felt caught between jumping for joy and firmly disagreeing. Choosing the next part of their adventure meant that Tori-san trusted him enough to make important decisions, but - with what he had just been told - it felt like one wrong move could spell disaster for his friend. What if he made a bad choice? What if he led them straight to danger?

“Are you sure? What if I pick a really boring one?” Usopp tried to max his inner concern using a joky question.

Tori-san shook his head and smiled, something that was only really possible with his eyes due to the map. The contrast between this merry expression and the tense discomfort Tori-san had just been wearing made Usopp feel more certain of himself.

He hadn’t been able to protect Tori-san so far but maybe, just maybe, things would work out if they ran into trouble in the future. Usopp would stand up to any villain that came their way with Tori-san by his side, neither of them putting the other in danger.

After all, Tori-san was his family; that was a truthful statement if he’d ever heard one.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hope you guys liked this chapter. Left it on a bit of a cliff but you'll just have to wait until next time.
> 
> Next chapter working title: sh*t hits the fan part 2
> 
> Sorry for the long wait on this one, I will endeavour to have the next chapter out by the end of the weekend as a consolation.
> 
> Please comment and tell me your thoughts so far! :D


	7. Conclusion of a Duo in a Singular Moment

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Setting sail onto another chapter of their journey, Marco and Usopp are going full steam ahead!
> 
> However, something is lurking below the surface of this merry autumn island...

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Prep some tissues for this one people!
> 
> I'm sorry in advance...

Marco stood on top of the railings of their ship; well, in the eyes of the law, it was the merchants’ ship. But they were in jail, and wouldn’t it have been more of a crime to keep a perfectly seaworthy ship in port. Usopp had been hesitant about it - which Marco had expected. However, it had been a week since then and that resistance had been replaced by enthusiasm when they hit open water.

The kid was a natural born sailor. He was at home in the rigging, sometimes doing things that had Marco close to pulling his feathers out in concern. Yet, he never did, Usopp was confident in himself for once and Marco wasn’t going to do anything to change that. The light that shone in Usopp’s eyes when they hit a fast current and a steady wind made him look like a new person.

Speaking of feeling like a new person, Marco fluffed up both of his wings. He revelled in the feeling that arose from having the two of them functioning; without them, it had felt like part of his soul was missing, somewhere in the then unreachable sky amongst the clouds. The pillow-dotted sapphire expanse above their little ship was calling to him, ready to greet him in the same way a mother does a child. Marco knew he wouldn’t be able to reach them on his first flight but that didn’t stop the anticipation from skittering up his spine.

He sighed contently, the breath mixing with the seaspray filled breeze; Marco was another step closer to being his entire self again and it felt nice.

Usopp came up beside him to lean on the wooden rail, staring out into the horizon painted in gentle blues, and asked, “Are you going to fly today, Tori-san?” His voice and smile was hopeful. Marco wondered who was more excited over the fact that his wing was healed: himself or Usopp.

Despite the twitch in his wings, he shook his head. They were set to hit land soon, the silhouette of the island in question steadily growing larger past the bow of their ship, and Marco didn’t want to risk being seen by some eagle-eyed townspeople - things could get messy if people knew a famous pirate was setting anchor on their island. It was an autumn island; given the time of year, there would be a layer of freshly fallen leaves across most of the island, the typical blustery winds of autumn islands working to blanket the landmass in a sea of fiery foliage. It also lacked a Marine base, as the nearest one was on the next island over, which would make it less likely for Marco to be recognised.

Marco stepped down from the railing, turning his back to the water, and ruffled his feathers. Speaking of hitting land soon, he needed to get Usopp to remake his disguise so he could help with getting the ship into port correctly. With that in mind, he glanced about the deck to find the boy’s large bag of supplies. He chirped to get Usopp’s attention before nodding his head towards said object.

Usopp raised an eyebrow at the sound then trailed his eyes in the direction of Marco’s own stare and placed a fist on top of his open palm, a gesture of understanding. He made a small ‘oh’ sound prior to him asking, “Wait here, okay? I’ve got something to show you.” His impromptu order came with a grin as he raced off into the bowels of the ship.

Marco blinked a few times after his exit and sighed. During their time together on the ship, he and Usopp had gotten better at communicating - Usopp understood his small gestures and caught onto his lines of thought quicker than a few of his men did - but that didn’t mean he could always tell what the boy was thinking. Usopp was still all over the place in some ways, he was a ball of emotional energy that clearly needed an outlet (maybe Marco could drag him to a craft store, kids liked to knit, right?), but he had been a lot calmer without their old companions.

Speaking of those assholes, while some small part of Marco took satisfaction in the fact that the pair were behind bars, there was also the looming concern over the lasting impact it had on Usopp. He had seen what near death experiences did to grown men and women time and time again; the results were never pretty for anyone involved in the ordeal, so how would a child process the same kind of event in the long term?

Usopp was already clingy. They slept in the same room, which was more for safety reasons - Marco’s current reasoning, but the situation would be different when Marco found his crew. He would be able to wade through the inevitable jabs and jokes sent his way when he arrived with Usopp in tow; yet, Marco didn’t know how much he wanted things to change from their current situation when he regained his human form and returned home to the Moby. The thought of being welcomed by his family the moment he stepped on deck and him being able to introduce the boy that had become part of that family during his time away made warmth tickle his chest, but Usopp was an unknown in that rose coloured scenario.

What if-

“Look! Tori-san!” Usopp yelled as he burst out of the cabin door onto the open deck. Marco caught sight of the object that trailed behind him before it was aloft above Usopp’s head.

It was a piece of navy fabric. Flowing in the wind, Marco couldn’t tell what it was but, by Usopp’s proud smile, he figured that it was something that he was supposed to be excited about. He walked closer to get a better look. This, however, didn’t make it easier to ascertain information about what the object was.

He tilted his head to the side with a soft coo to voice his confusion. Usopp’s grin momentarily dropped, along with his arms, before his mood bounced back and he explained, “It’s a new cloak, an actual one this time.” The garment was laid out on the deck so that it was displayed fully. “See, I found some fabric and sewing stuff in the hold, with a lot of other stuff. The fabric is super comfy and I thought it would look nice with your feathers,” Usopp patted the cloak to emphasise his point.

Marco copied his action. The cloak was made of a thick cotton, soft and breathable, and the colour was quite charming.  
“And it has a clasp, to replace the rope,” the boy demonstrated the hidden latch. He tossed the cloak over Marco’s back while he went on, “This way you can look even cooler than usual and take it off when you want.” Usopp finished his demonstration with a flourish and waited for Marco’s reaction expectantly.

Not one to disappoint, Marco mulled over his gift. The thoughtfulness of the entire endeavour, Usopp had made it for him after all, struck him in the heart and he fluffed his wings up against the fabric. It took a lot of self control not to snuggle into the cloth any more than that; Marco did, however, go along with his other whim of ruffling Usopp’s hair. He tittered when the boy yelped and made to swat his wing away.

For all his faults, Usopp was a thoughtful boy. He put others above himself inside his heart, something Marco could relate to, and that made it easy for Marco to give him the care he sometimes denied himself. 

Marco would leave his worries until they became relevant. After all, why ruin a perfect moment with things that may never become a problem?

\---

It was a festival!

The entire island was celebrating a festival; it was meant to help bring luck for the island’s next year of harvest as well as thank nature for the previous year’s success.

Usopp, however, had spent the day taking in the whirlwind of new, extraordinary sights. Tori-san had been the one leading their little duo through the port town’s large and crowded streets while Usopp wanted nothing more than to simply take in his surroundings. It was all so bright and amazing.

The entire town was decorated with colours that matched the fallen leaves that littered the cobbled paths underfoot. Streamers, flag bunting, ribbons of every size, every kind of decoration adorned every place they could possibly be put, meaning that some buildings looked more like a paper mache project gone wrong but people still seemed to be having fun as they decorated more. Speaking of the townspeople, they seemed to be fairing no better under the wash of autumn as their clothing matched the celebration around them - some even going so far as to augment their clothes with unused decorations.

People had been so welcoming too! They greeted each other as they passed and took joy in inviting travellers into the festivities. Tori-san had been his usual suspicious self, but he hadn’t stopped Usopp from returning the positive energy. Despite them sightseeing, Usopp had stopped to help any person that seemed to need it. The bird had, for the most part, followed his lead and chipped in between his own ventures into shops and taverns. This had played out in their favour, however, as Usopp’s last bout of ‘offering a helping hand’ had landed them a discounted room in an inn.

Usopp smiled to himself as he flopped onto the room’s fluffy bed, sighing when the plush sheets exhaled beneath him. The door clicked closed a little ways away and Tori-san sighed in reply. There was a rustle of fabric, followed by a mellow thump, before Usopp felt the bed shift beside him. He rolled over onto his front, leaning his chin on his hands, so he could face his friend to ask, “Isn’t this place nice? I never thought that parties could get that big.”

Tori-san tiredly cooed in response. He rearranged the pillows at the head of the bed prior to settling into the pile.

Usopp giggled quietly, he’d made a pillow nest, and began to absentmindedly kick out his legs, “I remember seeing something similar back home. One of my neighbour’s had a family reunion that filled the entire field behind their house! It was super loud, kept waking my mom up but she didn’t mind much since the noise was ‘dream-like’ to her.” He rambled without meaning to until he bit his lip, worrying the skin to the point it stung an angry red, and chanced a look at his friend.

Tori-san sat in his nest, unmoving and unblinking, as he listened to Usopp speak. While this wasn’t the first time Tori-san had given him every ounce of his attention, Usopp was still surprised that anyone would be able to listen to him with such genuine interest - other than his mom.

“I never got what she meant by it. The town doctor said it might just have been a fever driven hallucination, but she seemed completely awake when she said it… So, I don’t know,” Usopp explained. His eyes gaining a far off glaze as he took his focus away from Tori-san, lest he lose these suddenly gained nerves. “It was the last time she’d been able to look at me with clear eyes, before-”

The words were cut off by a gasping hiccup.

He didn’t want to say it out loud. Saying it would make it more real; it would bring the memory out into the real world, like the event itself, and to Usopp that would mean reliving it in some sense.

Was he a coward for not wanting to remember the dull sheen of his mom’s eyes as her grasp on his shaking fingers slipped into nothingness, as she slipped into the eternal black she had accepted long before that day? Would she want him to think about that moment? Did it seem right for a mother to want her son to repeat the single most traumatic moment of his life behind the inside of eyelids every time he fell asleep alone, without the sound of another to remind of him of the fact that he was alive while she wasn’t, like a record broken under the weight of his guilt?

She was dead.

A cut and dry statement. Yet, the words died in his throat, their swan song passing his chattering teeth and trembling lower lip as choked out sobs. The fact that he cried about it so much without even being able to verbally acknowledge it happened was the thing that hurt the most.

What were tears when the phrase was left weightless on his tongue?

Usopp sniffled. He sat up to rub furiously at his eyes, gathering some courage, and continued through shaky breaths, “She died of an incurable illness, the docors never figured out what it was. She kept smiling until the end, and here I am running away from the life she left me while crying like a baby. A big, sniffly baby.” He coughed out the last part before fully breaking down into his hands.

Now that he had said that long suppressed phrase, the words didn’t stop.

“It’s so unfair! I’m not even sure she would be happy knowing what I’ve done, all the messes I’ve made for the people around me, how useless I’ve been. How can someone be proud of that much failure? Be proud of me?” He muffled his own cries but Usopp knew that Tori-san was taking in every word. Tori-san…

He was just another person who would consider him a failure.

“She was always so proud of my dad too. Going on and on about the brave man he was and how he’d love to meet me one day, to know the kind of person his son had grown into. ‘Someone who’d always made her smile’, that’s who she’d wanted to tell him I was.” Usopp pressed his hands further into his face, uncaring about the screaming of his lungs at the lack of air as he yelled, “And what a mess I’ve made of that! I’m here, instead of there, and he may have been and gone and I don’t even know how that makes me feel. Am I supposed to want to meet the man who left a frail wife and young child behind? I know he couldn’t have known but he- I- I- I-”

He couldn’t breath.

Air wasn’t in his lungs and that was a big problem.

Usopp gasped, clutching at his throat with his right hand and leaning on the other. He wanted to inhale but his throat protested at the movement. 

Why couldn’t he breath?

He wheezed, the sound grating on his ringing ears, in a last ditch effort to do something, anything, to help his situation.

Then Usopp was picked up. The motion was enough to startle him out the tunneled perspective he had trapped himself in and for his throat to jerk a cough in protest. An intake of air followed the sound.

What should have been a relief after that moment of panic turned out to be painful in reality, the cool breath was icy on the raw insides of his windpipe and it stung his throat in a similar way to when one swallows too hot food. It was then that Usopp took stock of how light his body felt, not just because he was still being held. Like his consciousness slipped past his skin without anything else attached to it, Usopp wasn’t sure if he could move anything - he was too numb to even consider trying.

More movement brought better clarity, as well as the ability to feel his limbs, as Usopp was manhandled into what could only be described as a cradle against Tori-san’s front. His right side was pressed into the feathers of Tori-san’s chest while the rest of his was cocooned so that he could only see the ceiling above him. The other parts of the candle lit room were concealed by the other’s sky blue flames, flickering gently on his skin, while Usopp took more painful breaths to fill his whimpering lungs.

After he was settled, Usopp let out a pitiful cough and asked, “Tori-san? What happened? Why…”

His question was ended by the only answer he needed: Tori-san’s sympathetic expression. 

Against the honeyglow dipped twilight that danced across the room’s ceiling, Tori-san was a refreshing, uniform flame of starlight to Usopp’s scratchy eyes. He moved to rub at them again before slowly blinking up at Tori-san’s unwavering but questioning gaze.

For every question that Usopp asked to and of himself, he struggled to ask the ones that mattered to ones that cared about him. He dwelled too much on the ghosts that he felt clawing at his ankles, twisting at his throat, and never took a moment to cast his mind in the direction of his present self. Who cared about whatever hopes and dreams he was striving towards, in an effort to bury the undead terrors of his innermost fears, if the current Usopp no longer had the spirit to try?

How much negativity would become too much? When would the point come where he could no longer look at Tori-san and feel hope; where he thought of his mom as a cause of his misery rather than the greatest amount of joy in his life?

"I'm sorry," Usopp whimpered as his vision blurred with tears again. “You don’t have to listen to me. I’m probably not making sense and it doesn’t matter all that much…” His voice once again trailed off in a bout of hiccups until he gave up trying to speak entirely.

Then Tori-san leaned to press their foreheads together. Usopp would have otherwise giggled at the ticklish feeling that his friend’s plumage caused against the red hot skin, but the contact only served to quiet him. He found himself worrying a little over how cool Tori-san seemed to be in comparison to him, maybe his brain was overheating due to all of the thoughts inside of it

A gentle pressure at the right moment; that was all it took for everything in Usopp’s world to go quiet, for once. A pair of eyes bored into his own and every question seemed to have a findable answer, even if he didn’t know what it was yet. A distinct hum that reminded Usopp of the sky reflected in the ocean waves, free and endless and new, sounded.

“What is a family Tori-san?” Was the question whispered into the small space between them. “If I have a family where it’s only a mom and a son, then are there other kinds of families? Are we…”

Nodding, Tori-san said ‘yes, of course’. His feathers fluffed up against Usopp’s head and the boy finally giggled at the sensation. The sound was happy but tired, so very tired.

Usopp always considered home to be with his mom…

Yet, maybe she wouldn’t mind sharing that ideal place with Tori-san. Usopp’s home could be himself and Tori-san on their little boat.

A family of two in an endless ocean of blue and a sky full of stars.

\---

“Marines! Open up!”

Marco had not expected a wake up call, especially one screamed at the top of someone’s lungs as a fist banged against the door of their room. He grimaced at the volume.

Usopp yelped beside him, now waking up, bolting upright on the bed while he was still tangled up in the sheets. “Who’s there?”

His exclamation must have given the marines on the other side of the door a reason to pause. Marco held back his laugh at the sound of their whispers, the words of which were unknown but they seemed confused; the marines quietly spoke between themselves until one of them, a sweet sounding woman, called out, “Hello there dear, I’m Marine Lieutenant Savoi. We’re doing a room check, just a precaution for the festival. Y’know we want any bad pirates spoiling the party.”

How old did she think Usopp was? Savoi sounded like she was trying to persuade a toddler to hand over an important set of keys, not getting an older child to open the door during a ‘routine’ Marine operation.

Fuck that.

Marco internally sneered at the obvious lie in the woman’s words. They knew something was up, but just wanted to get it over with without the regular amount of property damage that came with apprehending a high bounty pirate. What did they expect anyway? If they didn’t want buildings destroyed then they shouldn’t go after people who had the power to reduce them to rubble in a single movement.

The Marines were idiots.

Marco finally stopped his mental joking session to take control of the situation before Usopp answered the ‘nice’ lady behind the door. He stood up on the sheets, as silent as a bird of his size could be, and assessed the room around them.

The room’s ceiling and severe lack of furnishings meant that there was also a severe lack of hiding places; laying under the bed was not an option given the fact that the sheets were wrapped around Usopp like a cotton caterpillar. The door was out due to very obvious reasons. Which meant that they were stuck.

Unless…

Marco hopped down from the bed, mentally cursing the unintentional scraping sound that the motion caused. Then he crept towards the room’s only window to take a peek at the street below. It was empty; the Marine’s hadn’t posted anyone outside, a big mistake on their part. 

It wasn’t that much of a mental leap to predict the plan that came to Marco’s brain as he turned back to Usopp. The boy’s wide eyes and shaking hands as he clutched the bedsheet gave him pause; calming Usopp down wasn’t a priority but Marco wouldn’t lie about crushing the desire to console him a little bit before they jumped out of the window.

Could Usopp even jump out of the window? It was only two stories. Maybe he could-

His thoughts were interrupted by the door being kicked in. It flew clean of its hinges and collided with the opposite wall, close to where Marco was standing. He didn’t flinch as it wooshed passed his head nor when it split in two against the wall.

At least two people screamed. Usopp threw himself onto the ground, sheets trailing behind him, on the side furthest from the door while he cried out. He huddled close to the wall.

Then the woman yelled, “Sorry for the intrusion,” as if this was a totally normal situation. She stepped into the room in front of a standard gruff looking Marine. Her uniform was a cleanly pressed black suit and white shirt set that matched prim flats; with her short, neat charcoal hair, she could have been mistaken for a successful businesswoman if not for the distinct white overcoat that all Marine Officers were made to wear.

Marco glared at her as her shoes clicked on the hardwood floor, echoing off the pasty walls, until she reached the end of the bed. The smile she gave in return was venomous, a fake kind of sweet that reminded him of flies on sugar, before she glanced at Usopp. He didn’t notice her eyes on him as he hid from the gruff Marine in the doorway, her grin widened.

“Well, well, well, I never thought I’d find a famous pirate like yourself with a kid,” Savoi mocked, making Usopp flinch and shoot his attention towards her, while Marco glowered at her. She ignored his glare to sit on the bed and coo at the boy, “Did this bad man kidnap you Sweetie? Do you need help?”

Usopp frantically shook his head.

He clearly wanted to argue her claim but was stopped when Savoi clarified in a sickly sweet lilt, “Does that mean that you’re a criminal too? Do we have to arrest you with this bad man?”

Usopp shut his mouth at that and looked pleadingly towards Marco.

This was a mess. If Marco could speak he would be cursing at the woman in front of him before kicking her back out the door, as a ‘thank you’ to her equally rude entrance. It was one thing to burst in and try to arrest him, it came with the territory, but threatening a child under the guise of caring about people and ‘justice’, she had gone too far. 

Marco’s hackles were raised as he prepared a grab and dash, the only way they were getting out of this safely. However, he only got to take a single step forward before something hit him from the side.

A single blow, glass breaking almost soundlessly against his skin. 

A single scream that came from a boy as he screamed. “Tori-san! No! Put me down! Put me down, please! Tori-san!”

\---

Who was breathing?

Was it him?

How could he still be breathing while Tori-san wasn’t?

No. Tori-san was still breathing, he just had to be.

Usopp coughed through the sniffles that spilled out onto the navy fabric cradled in his quaking arms. The material was already soaked through with tears, the stain uncaringly staring back at the boy as he sobbed harder, but that didn’t stop more from falling onto it.

A punch couldn’t take down Tori-san, not even one that sent him through a window, so he was fine. He was more than fine; in fact, Usopp expected him to burst into the holding room any minute now. 

The holding room…

He had never met any Marine before, let alone set foot inside any of their buildings, and so didn’t know what to expect. However, the white room with only a table and a chair seemed to fit the people who had dragged him, while he screamed bloody murder, away from his family. He had put up the best fight he could, clawing at the Marine’s hands and kicking whomever he could, yet nothing halted his kidnappers’ plans. Tori-san would be proud when Usopp told him that he’d bitten one guy’s hand. Usopp’s breath stuttered. The room was cold too, not even the room could care about him while he hugged the cloak into his chest.

Tori-san wouldn’t mind if he used the cloak. He should keep it warm for him. Yeah! That sounded like a good idea! Usopp could already imagine the smile on his face when he returned it.

A warm smile from a living Tori-san.

He couldn’t wait to see that smile...

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hope that wasn't too shocking for people!
> 
> Usopp and Marco separated against their will and a cliffhanger for all of you to enjoy.
> 
> Please tell me what you think! Until next time...


	8. An Acknowledgement of Origin

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Things go from bad to worse for Usopp as the scary Marine Officer gets her way.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Haha, sorry for the break between chapters.
> 
> I participated in Admiral Week which was super fun and my uni started up again which meant I was busy right after.
> 
> Please accept this offering of a chapter.

The fight had been easier than he had expected. It had only taken a scrape of razor claws across the face and a swift kick to the throat, one that made a crunch on impact, before the Marine hit the ground - unconscious or dead, it didn’t matter much to the white hot rage filling Marco’s body.

He kicked the Marine’s still form for good measure, taking a sliver of sick satisfaction when the man failed to react, as he cast his gaze towards the sky. The midday sun hung directly overhead; the multitude of branches which made up the forest’s canopy casting an otherwise beautiful shadow on the ground beneath him. Marco tisked, glaring uselessly at his previous opponent.

Despite the man’s weakness, he had taken Marco by surprise at the inn. Being punched out of the window hadn’t been on his agenda for the day and the unexpected attack had certainly thrown a wrench into his original escape. The Marine had then spent the ensuing fight keeping his distance, occasionally going in for a swing before hastily backing off again; it was an effective strategy, if the man hadn’t gotten cocky and started lowballing his insults. Too bad he wouldn’t be talking for a while, Marco kind of wanted to hear about his less than human parentage - something about a chicken...

However, by the late hour, it had been a waste of time. 

Dumb shitty Marine, always getting-

Marco cut off his own thoughts with a shake of his head. Enough with getting lost in his own head, he needed to track down the rest of the unit. Knowing how situations like the current one usually go, Marco knew that Usopp would have been kept as a witness (or a hostage) after his kidnapping and sequestered as a base of operations. Without a Marine base on the island, this place would most likely be a heavily manned ship in a secure port; it wasn't something a single pirate would necessarily take on by themself, let alone one not at full power.

However, Marco couldn’t ignore the repeating sounds of Usopp’s pleading screams as he was taken. The arctic fear that reverberated across every syllable of the boy’s words, every frantic yell of his name, made the joints in his wings twitch in barely restrained fury. He could fight as many men as they sent his way and Marco could care less about it, but they had stooped to an inexcusable low.

He took to the air with more force than needed, cresting past the canopy with an explosion of branches and rushing air, to scope out his position. The forest helped the port town to cradle an expanse of open fields, housing livestock and the remnants of crop lines, with the sunshine washing over everything in a layer of golden sparkle. Past the port town was an ocean, gently shifting in waves too small for Marco to see from his position, that floated a million diamond pinpricks across his surface.

Marco twisted in the air, trailing his eyes away from the homely landscape which surrounded the town, to take in the other side of the island. It was wild, free from artificial marks of human interaction, covered in trees and autumnal low lying foliage. A view fit for a postcard if not for one small detail, a concrete port and dock complex which sliced through the powder beaches around it. If Marco hadn’t been hunted down for many years by the organisation in question, he would have said that the Marines’ worst enemy was the environment.

They disregarded wildlife as much as human life, an unfeeling, tempered blade of steadfast ‘justice’. Would they even consider the difference between a blade of grass and a boy they had caught in the company of a highly wanted pirate? Scratch that, Marco wasn’t going to let them make that comparison. He just hoped that the choice was still his to make.

\---

Breathe in. Breathe out.

Count the time between the inhale and exhale, silence makes this time longer - who would have known?

Breathe in. Breathe out.

The sound hit the ghostly walls, like a heartbeat.

Breathe in.

The heart stopped beating. Maybe his heart would stop beating…

Usopp held his breath until his chest hurt, a sharp stabbing knife that spirited away his ability to feel. Then he gasped. It was a cowardly sound that made the knife bury itself further. His lungs felt relief but his soul was ashamed; a molten snake slithered up and down his windpipe from the pit of his stomach with each quaking wheeze.

He could see them, Usopp watched each solitary puff float lazily towards the ceiling, disappearing from this world before reaching their goals. Usopp wondered if he would be the same - his existence short and invisible in the grand scheme of the world.

Meaningless…

Useless.

A little ball of hot air, that was him.

Usopp closed his mouth tight. Even the sound of his own breathing was making him think negatively, what was wrong with him? He promised himself that he would find a reason to be happy at sea, a new, positive version of Usopp.

Yet, here he was, stuck in a freezing room in a Marine outpost. Sitting on the floor of a barren room while Tori-san was…

Tori-san was…

...was…

...

Maybe the white walls weren’t so bad. The colour white was neutral; it did nothing to the chill pitter-pattering its way through Usopp’s brain, stealing heat from his bones. It existed and so did Usopp, a couple of peas in a brick cage. Yep, tiny peas, the kind that people could step on a smush in a moment’s ignorance. People didn’t care about the feelings of peas, the Marines were people and Usopp was a pea, so by that logic the Marines didn’t care about Usopp. Just another group of individuals on an already long list, he supposed.

Usopp’s stomach growled. Thinking about food wasn’t the best idea, even if the thought was more about the uncaring will of his captors than eating. He had missed breakfast too, so had Tori-san.

Tori-san and breakfast. Breakfast and Tori-san.

Why did it have to be Tori-san?

The breath that wheezed its way out of his mouth around muted hiccups was as unforgiving as the sound of the shattering window from that morning. Tiny pinpricks marred his throat like he had inhaled a flurry of that same crushed glass. Swallowing did nothing to ease the pain caused by the escalating sharp inhales and teeth chattering exhales. His saliva felt too warm in his mouth, at a temperature matching that of the steadily renewing tracks on his cheeks, but it would be molten against the arctic walls - they were so cold after all - and that spitting it out onto the floor would not gain him any favour with whoever walked into the room next.

A Marine had dropped by earlier though. They had been friendly for the most part, offered him a handkerchief for his face, but they had told him that Tori-san had been tracked down and probably wouldn’t survive the battle. Usopp had called them a liar, Tori-san wouldn’t be beaten by anyone - they still needed to finish their adventure after all. They left pretty quickly when he refused to talk, too busy in the midst of another fit of tears.

His face was uncomfortable. The flush on the skin made it tacky, adding to the stickiness created by the dry tears. Usopp wanted to stop crying, it was pointless; he wasn’t in any pain or danger, right now anyway, so why couldn't he stop?

Tori-san would know. Tori-san would make it better and Usopp could just forget about everything for a bit, all of the danger and his fears.

No, depending on Tori-san too much was bad. Tori-san needed to depend on him too. Usopp still had to do something to prove that he was dependable, that Tori-san didn’t always have to be the one to save him. He had to be the one to get them out of this situation. Tori-san just had to stay safe and wait for him.

Yep, Tori-san was safe and waiting for him.

“Who’s safe and waiting for you?”

“Tori-san,” Usopp answered without thinking.

Wait…

Who?

He looked up from the ground to see the Marine woman from that morning. She smiled sweetly at him, closing the door behind her with a soft click, as she sat down at the table with an amicable introduction, “My name is Commander Hokkian, I’m the officer in charge of this base. Who might you be, young man?” Her uniform was in the same pristine condition as it had been that morning; the black and white of her color scheme made Usopp feel like she was made to match the room, cold, clean and unfeeling. 

Usopp sank back against the wall in an effort to hide from her unyielding stare. The mellow smile, an unnatural expression for her given by the minute wavers in her lip, didn’t reach her eyes. He had the idea of throwing the cloak over his head and that she would get that she wasn’t welcome anywhere near him, hopefully leaving him alone to formulate an escape plan. 

However, she ignored his uneasiness to gesture towards the opposite chair and order with a tone like synthetic honey, “Please come and sit down. We need to discuss some things before I can hand you over to the proper people.”

“Proper people?” Usopp asked, still on the floor.

“Oh yes, there is an orphanage a couple islands over who would be more than happy to take you off our hands. They’ve had a track record of raising some of our most promising recruits,” she answered, a hint of enthusiasm lacing its way into her voice.

An orphanage that raises people to be Marines, Usopp didn’t like the sound of that. Being raised to be the kind of person who punches someone through a window while they weren’t looking wasn’t something high on his list of things he wanted to do during his life at sea.

“Why don’t you come up here? It’s much comfier to sit on these chairs than the floor,” she suggested this time. Her smile was slowly becoming smaller, the quiver in her lip making it hard to maintain her illusion of kindness.

“I’m fine down here. Thank you,” Usopp refused in a polite tone, no use provoking the scary Marine lady. Sure, the ground was cold, but it was definitely better than willingly putting himself within arms reach of a dangerous person.

“How are you supposed to see what I have for you though?” She asked.

Huh?

Usopp blinked at her a few times, watching her expression stiffen between a barely holding smile and sometimes akin to annoyed boredom, before she reached beneath the white coat on her shoulders to take out a pale blue folder. It was placed soundlessly on the table and slid over to the empty chair’s side. Then she leaned back into her original rigid upright position.

He rocked forwards onto his knees to get a better look at the folder. It was clean, totally unblemished, and gave nothing away about its contents. Curiously, Usopp chose to go along with her requests for the time being, if a bit hesitant. He placed Tori-san’s cloak on the back of the chair, taking the time to wordlessly smooth it down and brush off any dust, before sitting down so that his back rested on the fabric. 

It was a comforting feeling on his back as he was stared down at by Hokkian. Neither said anything for a few moments, Usopp not oblivious to the fact that his every movement was being put under a microscope inside the other’s head, until she asked, “I’ll assume that you’ve never been interviewed by a Marine before. Is that right?”

Usopp nodded.

“Which means that you’ve been keeping out of trouble, like a good boy. Is that right?” The sweet lilt of her voice didn’t match the knowing shine of her eyes.

Usopp wasn’t sure how to answer. Marines weren’t exactly common visitors in Syrup, given how quiet the island was, a fact which he was now thankful for. Marines were scary!

“What’s this? You have been getting into trouble?” She questioned accusingly, the playful teasing only just catching the edge of her voice. The coldness she had shown that morning after Tori-san had been attacked, while she ordered for him to be dragged to this hellhole, was beginning to seep into her expression.

“No! Of course not,” he shot back in a moment of confidence. Usopp failed to maintain that gusto when she raised an eyebrow at his outburst, but still accused back, “Technically, you guys were the ones to attack us first. Wouldn’t that make you the troublemakers?” His voice got smaller and higher the more he spoke until it was comparable to a squeak by the question’s end.

“The Marines, as troublemakers? What a terrible concept for a child to have,” her laugh was dry, a desert of humour. “The work of that pirate I suppose.” She tapped lightly on the table, an annoyed drum of skin against metal that echoed throughout the barren room.

Usopp furrowed his brow.

Hokkian kept calling Tori-san a pirate. Could a bird be a pirate? He knew that Tori-san was a special bird, he was smart and super strong after all, but him being a pirate was a bit of a stretch...

Maybe not much of a stretch, but still…

His inner musing having failed him, Usopp bit the bullet to ask, “Is Tori-san really a pirate?”

“‘Tori-san’? You’re close enough to have a nickname for him, how troubling,” she muttered before answering louder, firmer, “Of course he is, he’s a member of a Yonko’s crew. How can you ask such an idiotic question?”

“Yonko? What’s that?” Was the oblivious question to follow. The tapping stopped. Usopp gulped. “I-is that something important?”

Hokkian’s hard gaze made him shrink back as she spoke, “How could a child born on the Grand Line not know about the ruling force of the other side of their own ocean? Where are you from? Surely, it would have to be some backwater village on a barely visited island…”

Usopp listened as she ranted for a while. It only took a few more sentences for her words to become less questioning and simply insults to this hometown she had imagined for him. His thoughts, however, strayed far from the tense venom spilling from her mouth as he dwelled on the fact that she thought he was from the Grand Line. 

Why the Grand Line? Was it something about Usopp’s appearance that made her think that? Or maybe the fact that he was travelling with Tori-san? Usopp had heard about all of the amazing things that were on the Grand Line, as well as all of the dangerous things the deadly ocean held within, so it would make sense if that was where the bird was from. She seemed to know a lot about Tori-san so that had to be it. 

Yet, what was someone from the Grand Line doing in the East Blue? Usopp’s mom had told him of the fact that their ocean was considered the weakest by the people of the other seas, which he thought was unfair and rude - there were lots of strong people in his village, like the town’s carpenter who could lift really big logs. The East Blue was the ‘weakest ocean’ so it was probably boring compared to the Grand Line, meaning that Tori-san would have no reason to go there. Unless...

“Um, can I ask a question?” Usopp interjected meekly, his stomach feeling heavy as a thought progressed into an unnerving realisation. Hokkian stopped talking to allow him to speak, her expression irked by the interruption. “Where am I? I mean, I’m from the East Blue so I thought that’s where we were but you’re talking like we’re-”

“On the Grand Line,” she finished for him. Her smile had returned, this one genuine and maliciously amused by his naivety. The glint in her eyes was unnerving, it was as if she was picking about Usopp’s every word and movement as the boy slipped gently down the back of his chair. “You really don’t know what’s going on? Do you? Who you’ve been travelling with?”

Usopp’s quiet numbness was the only response she needed to continue. She leant forwards to drag the pale blue folder towards her. Finally opening it, the contents were a stack of wanted posters, each in pristine condition within the orderly pile. After flipping through them, moments which for all Usopp knew were an eternity in themselves, Hokkian placed a single yellowed page onto his side of the table.

‘Marco the Phoenix’

Who?

His confusion must have been visible as Usopp’s question was answered, “First Division Commander of the Whitebeard Pirates. A highly wanted man with the power of the Tori Tori no Mi, Model: Phoenix. It grants him the ability to not only heal the wounds of himself and others, but also to transform into a phoenix. He is highly skilled and dangerous, the man you know as ‘Tori-san’.” Her words were calm, cool, collected, none of the things to describe the inside of Usopp’s head.

Now, to say that Usopp was frazzled by what he had just learned would be an understatement. He had so many questions. They raced through his head like shots of a poorly aimed pistol. There were people with amazing powers? People like that existed and Tori-san was one of them? Tori-san was actually a man, a pirate to be more precise? He was part of a crew. What were they like? They had to be powerful if the Marines considered Tori-san dangerous, right? But, he was also friendly so maybe they were too. Where were they? Were they missing? What if something bad happened to them? What if-

Before his thoughts could sink any further into the dark bottomless pit they usually spiralled down into, Usopp broke away from that train of thought with another. This question, however, made the sweat that had built up on his tacky skin during his moments of anxiety turn to ice: if Tori-san was a pirate, did he know Usopp’s dad?

Dad…

Usopp shakily sighed, his tremored breath slipping past his quivering lower lip. If there was a link between Tori-san and his dad then it made sense that Usopp would ask him to help them meet, that was the reason he set out to sea afterall. Yes, that was the logical next step - meeting his dad…

But, what if that didn’t matter anymore?

Usopp had never met the man. Heck, he didn’t even know what the man looked like.

Wait…

He left his head to cast a glance towards the wanted posters still in the pile. It couldn’t hurt to ask, “Is there one in there for a man named Yasopp?”

“Yasopp…” Hokkian muttered, brows furrowing in an irritated confusion. “How can you know his name and not know about the Yonko?”

“Um,” Usopp mumbled, eyes shooting down to his lap.

He cringed when she snapped, “Answer the question. You’re hiding something and I don’t have the patience to deal with someone who just alluded to a connection with another highly wanted criminal.” Hokkian flipped through the wad of paper before slamming one onto the table. Her voice was similar to an icy wind, “Now, how do you know Yasopp? Answer, or I will have you arrested for aiding a criminal.”

His voice was tiny as Usopp answered towards the floor, “He’s my dad.”

\---

It only took Marco a few minutes to realise that the Marine base was dangerously under equipped for an outpost on the Grand Line. Sneaking in had only taken flying overhead, none of the guards thinking to look up despite their current enemy having the ability to fly, so he had taken to sitting and planning his next move on their roof. If he had been at full power, then blasting open their front door and demanding his stolen family would be no problem; however, Marco grimaced at the still present pull from his leg and the fact that he still couldn’t escape his current form.

That meant another, more subtle, approach would be needed. Great…

Marco’s sigh was interrupted by the sound of a window opening just below. He peeked out over the ledge to catch sight of the Marine Officer from that morning being followed out onto a small balcony by a Seaman. “Commander, is it really just for us to use a child as bait to catch his relative? I know that the kid’s dad is a member of Yonko’s crew but isn’t this crossing some kind of moral line,” the Seaman’s voice was uncertain and small, matching their nervous stance as they worried their hands.

Marco raised an eyebrow at that. They had to be discussing Usopp, but that would mean that Marco at least knew of his dad - hopefully he didn’t know him personally because that really threw a wrench in his plan to punch said man in the face on Usopp’s behalf. He shook his head, that plan could wait for later; Marco went back to listening in as the Commander maliciously chuckled, “Oh hush, who cares about morality when justice will always be on the side of the Marines. We are the law, ruling our judgements against the pirate scum that infest every sea, and so my decisions will always be the right ones. Who are you to question them?”

“But Ma’am that boy isn’t part of that ‘pirate scum’. As far as we know his only ‘crime’ is being the son of a pirate, nothing more,” the Seaman countered slowly, clearly hesitant of their Commander’s wrath.

“The son of Yasopp, to be precise. A man who’s capture would lead to my promotion and yours, if you keep your mouth shut,” she corrected sternly. “We have a chance to take credit for the removal of two Yonko crew members and you want to pass that up for the sake of wishy washy ‘morality’.”

“But-”

“No more complaints! I informed you of this plan so that you could make all of the necessary arrangements to have the prisoner shipped off with us next time we sail, not to talk back Seaman. I can easily have you replaced, am I making myself clear?” Her voice was sharp and cold as she looked down at her still anxious subordinate.

“Crystal clear, Ma’am,” they sighed in defeat.

“Good, I’ll be leaving to make my rounds. See to it that my orders are carried out,” with that the Commander left, the click of her heels progressively getting quieter with each metronome-like step.

Left alone, the Seaman sighed once more while they leant on the balcony railing, “What to do? What to do?” Marco almost felt sorry for them. Maybe kicking their Commander’s face in would put them in a better mood, it would definitely improve his.

His main concern, however, was the fact that Usopp was going to be transported to the New World to be used as a hostage! Marco bristled at the nerve of that woman. Even someone serving under her own command could see how disgusting that idea was, so why couldn’t she? Usopp was a bystander in all of this, too young to be considered a pirate properly but old enough that he could easily be made into an effective bait.

If they both made it out of this, Marco was going to kill Yasopp, peaceful relations be damned. Actually death would be too merciful for him, perhaps his crew could help him brainstorm something better when they made it back.

“...What if-” The Seaman’s words cut themselves off. Marco looked down, broken from his musings, to find them staring right at him, eyes wide and jaw on the floor. They held up a shaky hand towards him while muttering, “M-m-m-” 

And now Marco, feeling a little less sorry for them, got ready to stop whatever call for help the Seaman was planning on letting out. This plan was cut short when that call for help was directed towards him as they dropped to the ground, head bowed in shame, “Please Mr Phoenix. I know you have no reason to trust me but I’m not certain my Commander’s actions are correct in this situation. The boy in your care seems like a wonderful young man and I would hate to see anything happen to him at her hands.” Their voice was wavering, “For that reason, let me help you free him.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hope you guys enjoyed this. Sorry if you were expecting a cool rescue, that'll come next time thought.
> 
> Please comment and tell me your thoughts - I love hearing from people.
> 
> Chapter will be coming slower now since I have classes but this fic will definitely continue!


	9. Slipping Past the Black Abyss

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A grand escape set into action on both sides of this story, but who's plan will work?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ahhhh! So sorry this took so long, I've been SO busy with uni work this last month and had no energy to write.
> 
> Here it is though, the chapter that everyone has been asking for!  
> Trust me when I say that I DO NOT plan on dropping this story any time soon - it will just take me a while to update...
> 
> Please be patient.

Marco blinked down at the Seaman as they rested back on their feet, still kneeling on the ground. Their expectant gaze was focused on him, eyes wide and pleading for his answer, while he looked back in confusion.

Had he heard wrong?

He tilted his head to the side to indicate his thoughts. Thankfully, the Seaman was quick to catch on, with more fast paced begging, as they made an exaggerated praying motion, “Even if you don’t want any help, please allow me to assist you. It’ll be easier to rescue the boy with someone on the inside. Surely you can see the reason in that too.”

It did make sense. Too much sense in Marco’s opinion, life didn’t usually go this smoothly so that meant something had to be off about this setup. His brows furrowed, instinctively fluffing up his feathers to make himself seem more intimidating, as if to ask, ‘What’s in it for you?’

The Seaman cringed away from the look. Their head dropped and they curled in on themself slightly, like they were a marionette whose string had just been cut. It took a moment for them to start speaking again; their voice was small, a mouse’s squeak compared to the screech of their earlier pleading, “It isn’t fair that a child has to suffer because of their parent’s mistakes. That little boy has done nothing wrong. Using him as bait, most likely traumatising and injuring him in the process, isn’t what the Marines should be doing…”

Marco would have scoffed if their voice wasn’t so determined, it was small but strong enough to carry their beliefs. He could admire that kind of conviction - it said a lot about a person, if they could hold onto their opinions in the face of negative odds. However, they hadn’t answered his question. The expression on Marco’s face stayed the same.

That was until they finally met his eyes again and continued louder, steadier, than before, “... I understand that as a pirate, you have every reason to hate the Marines, but I joined to uphold the sense of justice that I felt was represented by the Marines. What Commander Hokkian is planning is despicable and I cannot just watch it happen right in front of me.” They yelled the last part, “So, either help me or stay out of my way Mr Phoenix, because it’s my responsibility to help that little boy get out of this before something truly evil happens!”

Marco stared down at the Seaman for a minute or two. Neither said anything, the silence filled with the latter’s breathing, while Marco thought over the request. He remained visibly suspicious while he considered his options, which weren’t many. Marco knew that trying to sneak in as a bright blue, flaming bird was a stupid idea and he didn’t have his powers…

Marco nodded.

The Seaman’s face lit up and they saluted with a forced stern expression while they informed, “Seaman First Class, Sanuka, reporting for duty. I hope that we can work together agreeably.”

Okay, now, Marco could scoff.  
Sanuka, undeterred, dropped their salute and asked, “Should we move somewhere more secure? This balcony is very visible from below.”

The view that stretched out around them was pleasant, far reaching and almost totally open. Marco could clearly see the lines of harvested crops in the fields that bordered the island's beaches along with the still grazing cattle that dotted the landscape like stars in a twilight coloured sky. While that made the spot enjoyable, they were also exposed to the Marines below.

So, Marco nodded, making Sanuka flash a small smile, before gesturing towards the roof with his head. Their expression dropped and they asked meekly, “You want me to jump up to the roof?”

Marco nodded again. He craned his head to see the wall better, it was only a 2 foot jump. Then repeated his motioning gesture.

“Er…” Sanuka drawled lamely, eyes widely staring up at the edge of the roof. They took an attempt to jump, making it halfway there, prior to sliding back down the wall.

The sigh that rang in Marco’s head may as well have been audible as he resigned himself to the partnership. His thoughts went to Usopp…

He just hoped everything went smoothly for the both of them.

\---

‘Why were Marines so strong?’, Usopp questioned inside his head as he clutched at a doorknob.

Hokkian had returned to the interrogation room with another Seaman, the person who had visited him earlier, and ordered the person to ‘prepare the prisoner for transport’. Immediately, this order had turned into a chase within the small room as Usopp yelled in fear in which they repeatedly lunged for him. Those moments, while few despite his efforts to avoid the Marines at all cost, ended in Usopp being harshly tackled to the ground.

Having the weight of a fully grown person resting on his back had made Usopp’s lungs hurt, something worsened by the harsh yells he directed towards the Commander, “Why are you doing this? I haven’t done anything to you!”

Hokkian had scoffed, looking down at him as if he was a piece of scum, “Be quiet, this is much bigger than you. Just let the grown-ups do their work like a good boy and stop struggling against my orders.”

Usopp hadn’t understood her words but didn’t get a chance to question anything more as his body was manhandled from the ground like a sack of potatoes over the Seaman’s shoulder. The Seaman, thinking their grip on him was strong enough, had quietly comforted, “Don’t struggle so much. This will be all alright soon, you’ll see.”

“No! I’m not going to the New World, not while Tori-san is still out there,” Usopp’s yell had been ignored as the group left the small white room to step out into the equally icy hallways. His thought at the time had been as loud as his voice, pleading with himself to do something, anything, to have stopped himself from being so helpless.

“Don’t be so considerate towards a prisoner, it’s not as if treating him better will improve his behaviour, let alone his morals. Sanuka, you should know better by now,” Hokkian had chastised grimly back then, scowling more at the boy in her subordinate’s arms than the Seaman themself.

“But Ma’am, he’s just a kid. I don’t really think it’s fair to shackle him up like a criminal,” the Seaman had tried to convince in a distracted voice, their attention largely taken away by Usopp’s continued struggles.

“They start off young, every single one of them. The kind of scum that become pirates never learned a sense of justice and it’s clear from the company this child has kept so far that I’m correct,” the Commander had mocked. Her words had cut something deep in Usopp’s pride.

With malice he hadn’t known he had, Usopp glowered back at the woman as he had spat back, “I may be the son of a pirate but at least I’m not an asshole.”

Hokkian hadn’t replied besides scowling deeper. Her expression had been like an ice cold knife through the previous heat of the conversation, leaving behind a solid weight of rock between them. It had been stifling, until Sanuka intervened, “Perhaps we should continue down the hall, Ma’am. We shouldn’t keep the men waiting.”

“They can wait forever, I’m not leaving,” Usopp argued as he had kicked them in the torso. Looking back, he felt somewhat bad for the wince they had let out, but had refused to stop frantically kicking out his legs.

His plan had gone somewhat successfully when their grip slackened enough to free his arms. This newfound freedom of movement had been quickly used to push more of his upper body free; that had given Usopp the chance to swing back towards the door and grip at the doorknob.

This led to the present time, Usopp gave the Seaman another kick in the chest. He made a sound of triumph, which covered up a pained wince, when his feet finally met the ground again. Not leaving any time for him to be grabbed again, Usopp stumbled back into the white room while slamming the door behind him. 

His ears were ringing, drowning out the banging on the door, as he clutched at the doorknob. Usopp ignored Hokkian’s commands to open the door; instead, he dug his heels into the floor and held it closed until he felt his arms begin to ache. “Open this door, now! Your persistent interference in your transportation will only lead to worse treatment later!” Her voice came through loudly before a new set of much louder bangs started from the other side of the door.

“Ma’am! Please calm down! It wouldn’t be good for morale if the men saw you like this,” Sanuka tried. 

Usopp mentally agreed with their sentiments as he glanced about the small room, making use of the small lull in activity on the other side to think. There was only the table and chairs, same as before, and the cold, white walls that stared back at him - oblivious to his struggles. He dragged over one of the chairs to replace himself with it in keeping the door closed. With his hands free, Usopp stepped away from the door to catch his breath.

The beat of his heart against his rib cage was almost painful but Usopp pushed away that concern in favour of sinking to the floor. His previously screaming legs gave a sigh of relief when his knees, somewhat harshly, hit the cool surface of the ground. This moment of respite was overshadowed by the fear prickling its way across his arms; Usopp coughed pathetically, muttering to himself, “Just think, you owe it to Tori-san not to give up now…”

He trailed his eyes up from the floor towards the ceiling, hoping for some kind of divine inspiration, before stopping to stare at a point high up on the opposite wall. Eyes wide and close to tearing up, Usopp blinked up at the small window near the ceiling. A shaky smile made its way across his face after a few seconds of staring.

Freedom.

His happiness was shattered by the fist that crashed through the door, sending wooden splinters skittering across the ground in front of Usopp. The yelp that accompanied him throwing himself away from that side of the room must have caught the attention from the fist’s owner as they pulled it out of the newly made hole. Hokkian’s voice followed this exit as she maliciously sang, “I do so hope you weren’t harmed during that entrance. Please just give up now and come along with us, we wouldn’t want this situation becoming any more dangerous than it already is.”

If his entire being wasn’t consumed by bone chilling shivers, Usopp would have shot back about the hypocritical nature of her words. However, he did find enough courage to yell, “How about you just leave me alone then? Then there wouldn’t be a situation!”

“How dare you! You, you little-” Hokkian’s insult was cut off in Usopp’s mind as he turned his attention, away from the door, towards the window. He pushed himself from the ground, disregarding the quiver in his knees, then took several quiet steps across the room; at each fall of his feet Usopp took the time to check back at the door, watching for that arm to return. At the end of his journey, he stood directly below the window which was over a foot above his head.

Usopp glanced back at the window before he turned away to formulate a plan. If Tori-san was here he would probably just fight his way out instead of sneaking out through a window; although, in his opinion, if Tori-san did sneak out of a window then he would just have to jump and-

He glanced at the window, an idea already in his head.  
Taking a chance, he jumped towards the window, but only made it a few inches before hitting the wall with his nose. Usopp gently touched it, flinching back when it caused the red skin to sting.

Okay, that was a stupid idea...

He prayed that no one had seen him do that while he thought of something better to try next, a small request of the universe in his opinion. Superstition aside, Usopp brought his thoughts to the table and it was like a light bulb went off in his head. 

He got to work pushing it against the wall underneath the window, without taking the time to check the door; the action made a racket, causing Usopp to recoil as it grated on his hearing, but he persisted in following through with his plan. The jump from the floor to table was much more successful than the one from his original idea, allowing him to pull himself the rest of the way onto the piece of furniture, then Usopp stood on top of it.

He was only a couple of inches away from the window now, a short distance from escape. Usopp grabbed the windowsill in preparation to hoist himself up; his brain, which was working paradoxically too slow and too fast for his liking, took note of how strange the cool stone felt underneath his clammy palms. Then he heard the rest of the door’s wood splinter.

Despite knowing nothing good would come of it, Usopp chanced a glance behind him. The door laid in pieces, broken dark wood strewn about half of the room, and left the empty frame to act as the only reminder of where it had once stood as Usopp’s silent protector. Perhaps mourning an inanimate object was ridiculous, but he silently thanked it for its service.

His thoughts were broken, much like the door, by the telltale clack of Hokkian’s heels; like a metronome of death, just the sound sent a shiver down Usopp’s spine. His arms acted instinctively to pull him up to the window. Only a single pane of glass between him and freedom, Usopp could almost feel the breeze on his skin - or maybe that was the fear induced goosebumps that had made themselves comfortable on his arms during this mess.

Pushing with his hands proved fruitless; Usopp internally cursed his scrawniness when they slid uselessly off the window pane for the fifth time. This curse was mirrored verbally when a barren voice seethed from below, “And he’s climbing the walls, the desperation of criminals truly is sickening to watch, like a rat refusing to simply take the cheese from a perfectly good trap.”

Usopp wanted to insult the Commander, see how she likes being compared to filth, but the words died on his tongue when the window creaked beneath his hand. It didn’t take much additional pushing for it to swing upwards with a satisfying ripping sound as the rarely used hinges gave a cry in protest. Never had the sound of grinding metal been so sweet. Usopp maneuvered to slide through before stopping...

Maybe there was enough time…

“I may be a rat, but at least I’m not a demon,” were his parting words. 

The yell that chased his heels was worth it after he pushed himself from the ground. With the yellowing sky above him, instead of the skeletal white of the holding room, Usopp took in a deep breath before taking off into a sprint.

Time to find Tori-san!

\---

Marco perched on the edge of the base’s main building. The picturesque view had long since lost its charm as his attention had been stolen by the anxiety that sparked the nerves in his wings, periodically prompting him to fluff them in an effort to alleviate the sensation. It was a cycle, the near monotony of the situation slowly ground away at Marco’s patience like fine sandpaper against a sheet of curved glass.

Unpleasant imagery aside, he sighed for, what felt like, the millionth time as Marco waited for the signal to swoop in - literally - to save the day. Strange how a pirate was acting as a hero while the Marines were holding a child hostage, aside his new ‘ally’.

Speaking of said ‘ally’, Sanuka was an unusual person. They were meek but steadfast, a baby lion with confidence issues; their demeanour and appearance spoke of a naivety common in Marines of low rank whom had never encountered highly wanted criminals, such as Marco himself, yet their resolve to see ‘justice’ be served - even if it went against what their commanding officer’s ordered - implied a wisdom that would take them far in this complicated world of theirs.

However, waiting while the seconds filtered by as grains of sand being washed away by the sea, Marco began to grow unsure of Sanuka’s ability to go through with their plan. Doubt was a very foreign thins to him; after years at sea as the First Commander of the Whitebeard Pirates, Marco’s life didn’t have much room for hesitant or second thoughts because even a moment’s stutter could mean life or death for some of the people that depended on him. Usopp was depending on him, but that self-encouragement only served to remind Marco of the stakes he found himself almost powerless to turn in his favour.

Marco looked down at his claws, dragging them uselessly across the edge of the roof. If only he could turn back…

A piercing shriek sounded across the base, “I don’t care what it takes, capture that little piece of shit!”

Now, that didn’t sound like the plan going smoothly.

“Commander! Please remain calm, what will the Captain think when he gets here and sees you yelling at your subordinates?” Sanuka’s worried tone followed, minutely quieter, and Marco glanced down to see the pair exiting the base’s command building beneath him.

The Commander rounded on them, throwing her arms out to the side wildly, while countering just as loudly as before, “He’ll be less understanding of my actions if you fail to amend your mistake, Seaman. This could mean demotion if it gets out that I let the son of a highly wanted pirate slip through my fingers.”

“But Ma’am, shouldn’t we be more focused on preparing the base for Captain Thompson’s visit? We have less than an hour until they are expected to arrive,” Sanuka tried to reason, an obvious deflection in topics in Marco’s opinion.

“Like that matters when I could be reprimanded for this, my career is at stake!” The Commander snapped, a lilt of finality staining her voice. She turned away from Sanuka to storm off towards another building. Her actions prompted a chuckle from him, one muffled by his wing being raised to his face.

What a bratty woman. The Marines really didn’t have any standards for the people they employed.

Her words on the other hand were enough to cut his laughter short. Usopp had escaped? Marco would have felt proud if not for the fact that said act had thrown a wrench in their, otherwise completely functional, plan. He cursed himself for trusting Sanuka to get the job done. They were going to get Usopp seriously hurt and it would be his fault for failing to refuse the offered assistance in his rescue. 

He was Marco the Phoenix, a member of the Whitebeard crew, stuck relying on a low rank Marine to save part of his family. His entire world had been thrown on its side in less than a month. The mundane parts of his life became challenges while he dragged along a child who seemed just as lost and confused about himself as Marco felt in that moment. Who was he without his powers? What if he was stuck as a powerless bird for the rest of his life? What would happen to the both of them if Marco wasn’t strong enough to get them out of here? 

Sucking in air through his teeth, Marco willed his beating heart to still. He shook out the muscles and joints that had instinctively clenched and locked during his mental spiral. The sensation of the wind felt almost new to him, coming out of the deep well that had made itself at home inside his mind. It was a new feeling to become so lost in himself that Marco became unaware of his surroundings - maybe Usopp’s habits were starting to rub off on him. Perhaps that was why-

“Stop right there!” Was the next shout to shake Marco from his thoughts. Then a familiar scream came before a shot shattered the still air.

“Commander!” Sanuka protested, fear evident in their voice, “He’s just a child, drop the gun!”

“Not until he stops moving!” 

That was the only warning prior to another gunshot echoed throughout the base.

Marco was in the air as soon as the second shot rang out. This was no time to get lost in his thoughts. He took a sharp dive in the same direction as the Marine pair had gone a few minutes beforehand. Screw thinking entirely, this was a time for action.

\---

The first thing that came to Usopp’s mind after the second gunshot was that the sky was pretty. It was a gradient wash of autumnal shades. Each colour was almost too perfect, as if he was in a painting instead of stuck in a place comparable to his worst nightmares, but they were comforting in a way; warm colours always reminded him of sitting by the fire on evenings with his mom, both of them wrapped in a blanket with steaming soup. She would have also liked the sky. It was something she could have drawn…

The second and third things were less pleasant than the sky. The former was the fact that to see the sky Usopp had fallen onto the ground, most likely from shock. Shock caused by the bullet which had scraped past the left side of his body; the same side which bled out on the dirt beneath his unmoving form. It was hot in an unpleasant way, comparable to the memory of an old burn, and stuck to his skin in tacky globs on its journey to the ground.

The third thing he thought of was the pain from the wound. Actually, Usopp wouldn’t describe the feeling as ‘pain’ so to say. It was more of an unpalatable tingling that buzzed just above the surface of the bones in his torso. Was it strange that Usopp was now suddenly conscious of the fact that he had bones? He had never really felt them so much before, they had always just existed under his skin. They existed with him…

What was he thinking about?

…

Oh yeah, the sky!

It was so pretty!

Then a shadow blotted out the sun. It wiggled across his vision.

A worm?

“-n there!”

What?

“Stay awa-”

Who?

“Keep your ey-”

What was it saying?

Usopp became aware of sounds originating from outside of his field of vision. It was a muddled soup of flapping, yelling and muffled impacts.

Soup? His mom’s soup…

The worm left him alone. The yelling got louder all of a sudden before a different shape stood over him. It was much more friendly than the last one, closer to the warm memories of those days by the fire. It leaned in closer. It was blue and yellow - a small section of the morning sky right in front of him. The thing looked soft. Usopp wanted to touch it, so badly; he was sad that his arms weighed too much to move them.

There was a coo. It was soft, like the blue. Gentle.

“Tori-san…”

Yep, it was Tori-san.

“... you came…”

Of course he came, Tori-san always came when he needed him.

“... I did it, escaped.”

Tori-san was probably proud of him. Too bad his vision was too blurry to see anything more specific than general shapes. Usopp wondered why? He couldn’t have lost that much blood already, right?

Shock. Usopp had heard about people going into shock after things like getting shot happened. He was in shock - that made sense to him.

Who knew that shock made someone feel so tired? Usopp wanted to sleep. Closing his eyes sounded like a great idea, the best one he’d had all day. Hopefully Tori-san wouldn’t mind not having a story before bedtime.

\---

The fourth thing that Usopp noticed was that he regretted falling asleep.

His head felt like a lead weight stuck at the bottom of the ocean, intensified by the woolen sounds occasionally filtering through his wavy consciousness. The process of waking up started with slowly opening his eyes. The sight that greeted him was hazy, out of focus, and it was too dark to see much of anything.

Was it nighttime?

After blinking away the teary filter from his vision, Usopp sat up to get another perspective of the space around him. It was a wooden room without any windows - mostly unfurnished aside from the bed beneath him. Not much to go on so far, he moved the covers aside before jumping down onto the panelled floor.

The fifth thing Usopp noticed was how much the wound on his side hurt. He resisted the urge to clutch at the area near the wound, already recognising the push and pull of bandages and medical tape on his skin. He did not, however, resist the urge to push aside the material of his shirt to take a peek. The fabric wrapped around his middle hid most of the wound, aside from the areas where the skin was flushed an off shade due to irritation, so he left it alone for the time being.

He then became aware of the fact that the room’s swaying wasn’t just something his sleep infected mind had conjured up.

A ship?

Usopp’s head cleared up in a jarring sequence of thoughts that sent ice racing through his legs. The next few steps were accompanied by an equally quick paced mantra of: ‘I’m on a Marine ship, where is everyone, what happened to Tori-san, is he okay?’ The pit of his stomach rivalled the shore’s of a winter island in its coldest season by the time he reached the door. It seemed so large now, did it grow while he was crossing the room or something?

Usopp gulped, a poor choice of actions given how close his throat felt like it was made of sandpaper. The door loomed over him. His arms approached it hesitantly, hand twitching upon contact with the frigid metal of the doorknob, until Usopp stilled his crumbling nerves enough to pull the door free of its frame. The creak it let out made him cringe and brace himself for the reprimanding of a lifetime - mainly because it was going to be the one to end said life.

This was it, he was going to die because of a door! Usopp prayed that they would at least make it as quick and as un-pitiful as possible.

“Hey! Look who’s awake!”

Usopp opened one eye slightly, having closed them in an effort to reduce the chances of accidentally looking death in the face, to find the deck of a ship spread out in front of him. A very familiar deck…

Then who…

He blinked a couple of times to adjust to the sunlight before being able to take in the full view. There, right there, a few paces in front of him at a table full of paper sheets was Tori-san.

...and the kind(ish) Marine from before?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I hoped you enjoyed this chapter!
> 
> Another cliffhanger, I know, but that just leaves people wanting more. Next chapter promises to be an emotional one so please keep following my work.
> 
> I also wanted to inform people that I've been selected as a writer for the OP Fashion Zine so that will be taking up some of my writing time for the near future, but I will be working super hard to write this story. I promise.
> 
> Do tell me your thoughts in the comments!


	10. The Result of Life's Messes

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Talking is sometimes the hardest part of life...

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey there everyone! Sorry about the long break, this chapter needed a little bit more work than I thought. Hope everyone enjoys it!

It had been a week - well more than a week, eight days to be specific - since Usopp had spoken to Tori-san…

Avoidance is too severe a word for what Usopp was doing, so he preferred to think of it as ‘not-spending-time-in-the-same-space-because-I-almost-died-again-and-I-don’t-how-you-feel-about-it-itis’ - which is totally contagious and him hiding away in his room is Usopp’s way of protecting Tori-san. Yeah, that makes sense. Usopp was being heroic, not awkward and avoiding his problems at all.

Usopp sighed deeply, as if breathing out the nervous energy cycling through his lungs, after breaking out of his own self assurance. He stared at the sky, back against the wood of the ship’s deck, and watched the meandering clouds pass by overhead at a pace that mirrored his own sense of self. He kind of wished he was a cloud sometimes. Sure, the height would be a problem but they wouldn’t be much to bother him in the sky (or maybe it was him that wouldn’t be a bother to other people).

A bother…

The scratch on his side protested weakly at the exaggerated movement of his diaphragm. Usopp sighed again. It had healed nicely, from what Sanuka had commented while poking at it a couple days ago, yet the scab pulled unpleasantly at the skin around it. Maybe if he pulled it off…

The feeling of the healed bullet wound was a distraction, Usopp focused on it when his mind would rather give a spotlight to the persistent itch on the back of his skull that scratched the edge of his neck and spine. He didn’t want to scratch it, couldn’t touch it; Usopp flexed his fingers, dragging them harshly on the wooden planks between him to savour the scratch on his fingertips, and shifted his gaze towards the crow’s nest when scraping sounds overshadowed his attempt to dispel the tingling in his arms.

Tori-san sat on the edge of the crow’s nest, a bird on a perch. He was pointedly looking at the horizon, body poised to take flight at a moment’s notice. He was so cool.

Usopp pursed his lips, holding his breath, as he gently sat up. He too stared at the horizon - marvelling at the mirad of skies that reflected back at each other in the ripples of indistinguishable waves. It stretched on forever as an endless loop of clouds and solar diamonds. He wondered if the ocean was truly unlimited - a wadded ball compared to a pristine sheet - and should that be so: would Tori-san leave to go home?

That was something that Usopp had learned about Tori-san, that he had a crew (a family) that was likely to be missing him. The man named Marco the Phoenix who had cool powers, which were the reason said man was currently a bird, was part of a super strong crew that lived a life of adventure and risk. He was a brave person who did more amazing things in his average day than Usopp had done in his entire short life. He was way too good to be spending time with someone like him - a snivelling kid who managed to get himself shot trying to not be a burden, only to turn into a bigger one.  
Marco…

Tori-san…

Did he really know the man? Bird? Did Usopp even care anymore?

Tori-san leaving and going back to his family; the idea made sense to Usopp, so why did the itch hurt his eyes?

The journey to stand on his feet was short lived but jarring to his distracted mind. Usopp dusted off his overalls to hide the sporadic twitch in his joints. He needed to leave, run away before Tori-san could take to the sky and create another shadow for him to chase.

At the start of this adventure, Usopp was tired of running. His knees had been weak and scraped along a trail of smouldering sugar and ice. The steep incline away from the shadows that stalked his every nocturnal thought seemed almost vertical until it had been swallowed up by a bright sea of cerulean that gently carried his prone form to a destination he had yet to find. Tori-san had been a rock, an ocean, a breeze, a presence, a bandage, a fath-

Usopp made his way into the bowels of the ship. He skittered past every dark corner that threatened to drag him under and ignored the clawing realisation that he was once again running back towards the shadow he had steeled himself to forget. Where was he even going? What mattered to him anymore? Who was important?

Eventually, his feet led him to the ship’s galley. It was a well lit and cosey room furnished with hardwood and cast iron. The smell of something tangy but burnt greeted him like a reluctant ally. Usopp’s expression turned sour when smoke filtered across his vision while a voice apologised through a coughing fit, “Sorry, sorry, thought I’d work on dinner while you two stared off into space.” The sound of a hinge creaking preceded the room clearing and the air becoming breathable. Usopp blinked to dispel the tears gathered at the corners of his eyes.

Sanuka stood near the galley’s oven. They frantically fanned at the plume of smoke billowing out of its vent with a towel. Usopp took a step forward but was halted by Sanuka firmly instructing, “Stay back, it’ll be worse if you get burned on my watch.”

Doing as he was told, Usopp stood off to the side of the action while his companion cursed under their breath. He hadn’t known what to make of their new crewmate when he had first woken up from fainting at the Marine base. Their involvement in his imprisonment left a bad taste in his mouth but from what they had managed to blubber out during their first evening together between hasty apologies and expressions of concern was that they helped him escape in the end - something confirmed by Tori-san.

Sanuka was a pretty average person. Outside of their Marine uniform their features became more noticeable. Their soft cream hair, always wrapped in a tight bun, matched their pale, unblemished face. They weren’t all that tall, but neither was Usopp so that was okay, but made up for it by having rigid posture that made them seem a little taller. Their personality almost did the opposite; Sanuka shied away from loud sounds and spoke with a caution comparable to a skittish deer.

Sanuka wrenched the oven door open before pulling out the source of the smoke - a charred black dish of…

...something. 

They exhaled tiredly while setting it down on the counter, “I shouldn’t be wasting food like this.” Their face reflected an inner frustration that Usopp could empathise with. Sanuka’s shoulders slumped momentarily before their demeanour changed to take on a more positive glow. They turned and leant against the galley counter to better ask Usopp, “Did you need something?”

“Not particularly…” Usopp mumbled, still staring at the inky mass of disappointment. He wanted to ask what it was supposed to be, but maybe that would be rubbing salt on the wound at this stage in the dish's life - or afterlife.

“What about you and Marco then? Have you spoken to him yet?” Sanuka questioned gently. Their stance was open and their tone hinted at an inner concern edged with curiosity. It was supposed to be comforting, supportive, so why did it send Usopp’s stream of consciousness down a bottomless waterfall?

He recognised the posture of a person avoiding a sensitive topic. Usopp learned that adults always had the same tells when they were trying to be delicate with children - i.e. him. It had been nice for a time. The silence on their part made the quiet echo inside his head after his mother’s death audible. However, when they spoke - offering words of condolence and assistance out of obligation instead of emotion - the sound was louder, like a hammer on sheet metal, but it meshed too well with cotton wool in his ears.

Usopp didn’t want Tori-san to be another person who pitied him.

He shook his head. Sure, speaking to Tori-san was low on a very long ranked list of things he would rather not do, but that didn’t mean that he was ready to jump into whatever conversation they needed to have to break the stomach churning tension that accumulated between them after their (in some ways not so) daring escape from that Marine base. Tori-san could be patient, of course he could, so that meant Usopp had all the time in the world to avoid him…

Yeah…

…

Oh, who was he kidding? Himself? Absolutely. 

Usopp sighed and gracelessly leant against the nearest counter, uncaring of the fact that he hit his head (maybe it would knock some sense into his dumb brain), before sliding uselessly to the ground. He couldn’t talk to Tori-san after proving that he was incapable of protecting himself for what felt like the millionth time. The resolve to be the one to protect Tori-san had all but been shattered by the bullet that had also grazed his side. Anyone could tell that he was worthless, spineless, directionless - lacking in every way a person could possibly think of - and now that Tori-san could fly there was nothing stopping him from leaving…

...other than pity.

“Hey, hey, no need to cry Kiddo. What’s wrong?” Sanuka’s voice was sticky, saturated with concern that wavered into the depths of distress that threw around Usopp’s stomach like a rowboat in a sea storm. They crouched in front of him, mindful of his personal space despite how much their stance shifted - wanting to initiate comforting contact. They were blurry.

Usopp trailed his unfocused eyes down to the floor, to the cool surface of the kitchen tiles. He had a thousand and one answers to that question but none of them seemed useful to him as he took note of how bad the room still smelled, the air of burnt lingering despite the open window, and how clammy his palms were against the stone beneath them. Was he even too much of a coward to speak now?

“Why is Tori-san still here?” That was the wheezed question Usopp’s brain supplied.

“Huh? You mean Marco the Phoenix?” Sanuka asked reflexively.

Usopp almost flinched hearing the man’s real name. He felt so stupid. Tori-san was just some dumb nickname he had made while packing up camping supplies on a little island; it was Usopp’s dumb little nickname for his best friend in the world. Marco the Phoenix, Tori-san to some, his best friend in the world and a super powerful pirate.

“Yeah… Him,” a whispered response.

“Well, I don’t know. In fact, I don’t know why he’s here in the first place?” Sanuka admitted a touch too bluntly. Usopp blearily blinked up at them while tilting his head to the side slightly. The ex-Marine floundered, hands waving wildly between the pair in a motion of surrender, “I mean, how exactly does one become the temporary guardian of the child of a pirate on a rival crew with said child not even knowing their name, title or rap sheet?”

When you put it like that, Usopp supposed their situation was a strange one.

“And why exactly is Marco still in his phoenix form, he hasn’t changed back once throughout my entire stay here? I would very much like to thank him, you know,” they finished awkwardly. Sanuka’s eyes were searching but still held that gut punching hesitance that left Usopp feeling somewhat hollow and uncertain himself.

“Well, I didn’t even know he was a person. I thought he was just a super smart bird this entire time, a magical one made of fire and the power to beat up bad guys,” Usopp answered lamely. Saying it all out loud made his mental image of Tori-san seem so childish in comparison to the persona the rest of the world apparently viewed him as. Yet, it never felt like Tori-san had been playing a role in front of him; each small moment of quiet companionship, every ad-libbed tale of their adventures re-imagined to fit Usopp’s naively heartbroken perspective of their narrative which were taken in and understood with more care and attention than they deserved, all of the times Tori-san made him feel at home, Usopp knew Tori-san and, if Marco wasn’t just a great actor as well as a pirate, that meant he also knew Marco the Phoenix (if only as a fire bird who fell from the sky and sailed the ocean with him). Usopp found himself smiling as he mused, “Maybe that’s all I really need to know about him.”

“Well, he is still a very dangerous man. You can never be-” Sanuka tried to reason, confidence shining momentarily, until Usopp frantically shook his head.

“Why are adults always like this? Tori-san is the only reason I’m not dead yet, on this silly adventure I threw myself into. If I’m not allowed to trust him after that then when can I? Yes, he’s a pirate but so is my dad,” Usopp fully reasoned, his tone beginning firmly before growing more tired as he went on. 

Just mentioning his dad was enough to make everything on Usopp’s mind a hundred times more taxing. The man named ‘Yasopp’, Usopp’s father and Banchina’s husband, was a man who answered the call of the sea to leave behind a quiet, little island in the East Blue. ‘Yasopp’ was a name - a man in some regards but none that meant much to Usopp - that almost got him killed, the lingering pain skittering across his side made sure to remind him as much.

“He’s the one that beat up a couple of kidnappers, taught me how to sail a boat, saved me from the Marines and-” He hiccuped. Tori-san really had done so much for him and now Usopp was ignoring him out of shame, petty shame. “He listened to me and understood.”

“Understood what?” Sanuka questioned, lost in Usopp’s emotional rambling.

“Me…” Usopp began to cry in earnest this time, uncaring how pathetic he looked curled up into a ball on the kitchen floor. “I don’t want him to leave! Not again, not another person who leaves me alone, but I can’t stop him. Tori-san doesn’t need me keeping him here, away from his real family like a selfish baby.”

Sanuka was obviously uncomfortable with everything being thrown at them by the sobbing child on the ground. Their vision shifted from Usopp to the door for a few moments. The Marines never trained them in how to comfort people, just how to interrogate criminals (and children, a more recent development).

What to do? What to do?

Their brows furrowed in concentration while they worried over their plan.

Perhaps…

No, no, that wouldn’t work.

Maybe…

Sanuka stood up from the ground and left the kitchen while murmuring, “Just stay here for a minute, I’ll be right back. Everything will be okay, I promise.” They didn’t know if their words were meant to comfort themself or Usopp.

Having not clocked Sanuka’s departure, Usopp continued his babbling, “Going back home won’t be too much of a problem, just need to make another boat. Yeah, a new boat. Tori-san can have this ship to find his family, his real family, and I’ll be left on an island with some trees to make a new boat. Alone. Alone again... I don’t wanna be alone, but maybe it’s for the best. Being alone builds character.”

Being alone would help Usopp become a man, it was the reason he left home. Nothing mattered besides that to him; afterall, now that he knew where to find his dad, he’d have to become a man before he could face him.

\---

The sky was blue today.

Marco knew that the sky was blue most days but since that morning it had taken on what he considered to be more of a thoughtful hue, as if it too were lost in itself. He often spent his flights, after the weight of multitudinous responsibilities blew away in the wind as it slipped past his wings, wondering if the sky changed to suit the mood of whomever was gazing at it the longest (or if it was simply Marco processing his own emotions through the means of personifying tropospheric vapour).

Marco had a lot to think about, so the sky was thoughtful too.

He wondered once more if he should be the one to close the freshly formed emotional chasm between himself and Usopp. He wasn’t dumb and knew when someone was avoiding him, especially when said person was as subtle as a brick through a glass window. Usopp’s injury had been a lot for him to handle; without his powers in his current form, Marco felt near useless being dependent on Sanuka’s subpar medical skills - which they demonstrated around floundering hysterics. A gunshot wound was enough to take out a healthy grown man if it wasn’t treated with the care and attention it needed so for a child to sustain such an injury, who knows how many times more dangerous it was (well, Marco did because it was many, many times more dangerous).

Sleeping by Usopp’s bedside, while uncomfortable, had helped keep him at ease. The rise and fall of the boy’s chest became the only reason air filled his lungs for those days. Shame had painted his every waking thought with darkened hues. They enhanced the shadowy memories which replayed alongside the ceaseless beating on Usopp’s heart. They acted as aids to the clawing arms that seemed intent on dragging the broken image of the unconscious boy into the unseen chasms of Marco’s inadequacy.

When Usopp had woken up there was so much Marco had wanted to say, but he couldn’t. Marco had never felt so trapped; yet, the jail bars around his voice were once the blade of the Whitebeard Pirate’s First Commander, his phoenix form was his prison and Marco didn’t know how to handle that in the way that Usopp needed him to. The boy viewed him as the strong, dependable ‘Tori-san’, not Marco the pirate who could turn into a bird made out of fire, but that was an image which had been shattered the moment that Marco had lost control of their situation. Could he be the person that Usopp wanted?

“Marco! Hello! Are you up there?” Sanuka’s voice came from below.

Marco shuffled along the edge of the crow’s nest to take a peek at the deck. He was surprised to find Sanuka in a state of disarray, their flailing arms beckoning him closer frantically. Taking one last glance at the now honey dipped horizon, Marco slipped down from his perch to greet his rattled companion.

Sanuka wasted no time in taking Marco by the shoulders, their hands shaking uncomfortably against Marco’s feathers, to shake him while explaining, “You have to come now, to the kitchen. Usopp started crying about a whole lot of stuff I don’t understand, but I think he really wants to talk to you about something.”

His first instinct was to shrug himself out of Sanuka’s hold, being manhandled was on his list of things that he was not entirely okay with strangers doing to him after all. Marco glared at the ex-Marine for a moment. They responded by shrinking back minutely and (thankfully) keeping their hands to themself while explaining at little more calmly this time, “Usopp needs you.”

His glare softened.

Marco wasn’t sure he was ready to have whatever conversation life was reading itself to throw him into; heck, he couldn’t even take part in that imaginary conversation. However, it was also time for him to stop being a coward and get over the sense of dread which had manifested as an inability to reconnect with the person who needed him most. Marco was not a coward and it was time to stop acting like one.

He was ready to comfort his s…

Nope, not ready for that, Usopp was his family. Marco was going to comfort his family.

That just left one question: where was Usopp?

Marco turned his intense attention on Sanuka, as they spent his thinking session worrying their hands, before nodding his head. Helpfully, his companion took the hint and scrambled for the nearby doorway.

\--

“... He’s going to leave and I can’t stop him. What if- No, that would technically count as kidnapping and that’s illegal. He’s a pirate though, maybe he wouldn’t mind…” Usopp’s endless rambling came through the gap beneath the kitchen door at a pace which had Marco wondering if the boy was breathing throughout his speech. Maybe Usopp could pass out before they had to speak, putting off important conversations sounded like a good idea - yep, a hundred percent amazing idea. Yet, in Marco’s experiences of his ranting, this was unlikely to happen and he just needed to give up his weak attempts at avoiding a situation that had his soul cringing.

He also needed to remember to tell Usopp that he would ‘mind’ if he got kidnapped when he could speak again.

Marco pushed open the door to the kitchen. He hoped that his demeanour remained visibly aloof as the door made its unceremonious contact with the wall, clunking as it went, and startled Usopp out of his own head. That hope was dashed when Marco’s heart sank at the boy’s tear stained face as Usopp attempted to rub at the liquid streaking down his cheeks and plaster a smile on top of his still chattering teeth. “Hey, Tori-san,” Usopp drew out the first word in the midst of pushing down whatever obviously deep seated anxiety had managed to bubble to the forefront of the boy’s consciousness long enough for him to have a breakdown. “Did you need something? You hungry?”

Marco huffed at the deflection. Eloquent speech and mental warfare were not a powerful part of Usopp’s bag of tricks. He ignored it in favour of stepping inside and letting the door swing closed behind him. The thump it made as it hit the door frame seemed too loud in comparison to the oppressive silence that held the air between them in a chokehold. 

Marco was aware of how much he was breathing, and how much like smoke the air tasted. What happened? That million bell question held itself on the tip of his tongue like a drop of rancid syrup. He wanted nothing more than to voice his thoughts, to make real every single thought that had managed to swim past the spotlight that represented his internal focus, but all he could muster was a coo that couldn’t be described as anything other than pathetic. 

What the fuck was that?!

Shame could not even begin to describe the molten sensation which skittered up his wings. Marco now understood the notion of wanting to crawl into a hole and never come out again, he wanted to leave and forget the entire encounter (praying that Usopp would do the same).

Then he met Usopp's eyes.

There, in front of him, was the same small boy who had spent weeks saving him from dying at sea; Marco stared down at the boy who had chosen to heal and help him instead of using him as a mildly delicious dinner, giving him a chance to go on an adventure along a stretch of sea which he would have disregarded as painfully average in any other situation. Usopp was staring back at him as Tori-san - the cool and powerful bird who he first thought was a shooting star and whom he loved - and as Marco - a man who loved him back - and all Marco could think to do was run away. What did being the First Commander of the Whitebeard Pirates mean if his only reaction to his less than pleasant feeling was to stare dumbly at a crying child?

Yes, Marco felt shame; he was ashamed of himself for not having the power to protect Usopp from danger, but also not being mature enough to realise that he couldn’t stop every form of danger from seeping its way into their lives. Life was dangerous and messy, no matter how famously powerful one got, and as an adult Usopp was depending on him not to run away in the face of that. 

Yet, Marco did run. Marco did run away from him under the guise of giving him space and broke the window pane of Usopp’s trust…

...and he couldn’t even apologise.

Marco blinked down at Usopp. His vision blurred and he didn’t bother to stop the liquid trickling past his emotional defenses to trail down his cheeks.

There was so much he wanted to say. He wanted to tell Usopp about how much his stories make him laugh, how much the boy’s smile reminds him of clouds, how much he wants to punch his dad in the face for leaving behind this compassionate, quirky child, but he couldn’t and that was unfair. None of that was his fault though.

Usopp blinked up at him. Tears began to well up in his eyes too.

“Why are you crying? Tori-san? Why are you crying?” Usopp asked while rubbing at his eyes, trying to hide away from Marco’s softened gaze. He was so small. This tiny child was depending on him and he couldn’t thank him for giving Marco that trust. 

Did it matter?

Marco used his wings to cocoon him as Usopp broke into sobs. Small hands created a near unshakable grip on his feathers. They sought to keep him there, in the fragile moment, but they both knew neither of them was going anywhere. 

...

“Please…” Eventually came the mutter.

“Please don’t leave,” was the full plea. Usopp’s grip grew impossibly tighter, his knuckles surely a frightening pale shade outside of Marco’s gaze, “I know I’m not much of anything, but please stay. I’ll go anywhere you want, but take me with you.”

Marco met Usopp’s physical contact with tender touches that must have made the boy feel as if he were being strangled by pillows. Yet, the amusing imagery did nothing to overshadow the relief and frustration that simultaneously flooded Marco’s soul at the request.

Of course.

Just don’t leave me either.

Don’t leave before I can say what I need you to hear.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ending on a crying scene, fun times for everyone!
> 
> Next chapter will mark the start of some action filled fun, so look forward to that. Tell me what you think in a comment, I love hearing from everyone who takes the time to read my work!
> 
> Until next time, bye bye!


	11. Destination of Destiny/Mystery/Embarrassment

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Meeting up with Marco's crew spells uncertainty for the future.
> 
> It's a good thing the present is taking the time to act as the calm before the storm.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> New chapter so close to the last one? I really just wanted to get this written while I had inspiration.
> 
> Enjoy!

The day had begun without pomp and circumstance - a regular morning to an average day on the high seas. Comparing it to many of their other less than pleasant wake up calls, Usopp kind of liked the lack of grandeur as he stepped out onto the sun stained deck of their ship. He grinned at the warm hug bestowed upon him by the amber light.

Chancing temporary blindness for the sake of maintaining this newfound sense of whimsy, he glanced up towards the crow’s nest. Tori-san was still looking at the horizon. The bird had spent every daylight hour up in the highest point on the ship to stare down the line between the sea and sky with an unwavering determination that kind of made Usopp worry about eye strain. However, since their bout of shared emotional tears a few days ago Usopp had started to spend a few hours up in the crow’s nest staring at the sky too; in doing so, he made sure Tori-san wouldn’t get lonely up there without him filling the silence.

Bringing that train of thought to its logical conclusion, Usopp started his journey up the rungs at the side of the ship. This was his favourite part of his current version of daily life, the slow, controlled climb up the ropes as they gently swayed in the salt seasoned breeze. It was a short trip between the (almost) land and sky that felt familiar as well as heroic enough to have Usopp feel like a brave seafarer. Reaching the top was the best part, seeing the stitched together line between the sea and sky never got old because it was a different version of the same breathtaking landscape painting - each edition deserving of a spot in a fine art museum. Usopp could look out at the eternally constant shift of the cotton candy vapour above his head and wonder what it was like to touch them. 

Then he could turn towards Tori-san, who took a break from his longing, to ask a million and two questions at someone who had actually been up there. He didn’t hold back. Usopp had spent days spewing out whatever question managed to catch his attention amidst the myriad of topics dripping through his filterless mind. Of course, most of those inquiries came down to a series of nods, head shakes and looks that said ‘are you being serious?’

Being the master sleuth that he was, Usopp had still learned a lot about Tori-san’s crew. They were a powerful group of pirates that served under a man named Whitebeard (a fact supplied from the external source of Sanuka), who was super tall and very strong, but they were also a family. Tori-san had been with them for many years. He trusted them to watch his back in any situation, but that didn’t mean that they failed to do things that gave him headaches and make him want to throw them into the ocean.

It all sounded wonderful. Tori-san’s life was loud and hectic, but he had people to depend on that he could unashamedly call his family. Usopp liked the sound of that - a big, noisy family.

“Hey Tori-san, have you found them yet?” Usopp asked while settling himself beside the bird. At the sight of Tori-san’s negative gesture he sighed, “Maybe you should take a break. I don’t know what birds can do for fun, but maybe you could take an afternoon nap or something.”

There was a huff, but that wasn’t a ‘no’.

“It’ll be great! I can take over the watch and you can make the most of a few quiet hours within the dark and mysterious bowels of our ship. A win-win scenario,” Usopp tried to persuade without bursting into a fit of laughter in reaction to the unimpressed glare being shot his way. “Okay, fine, I get it. You don’t feel like solving an action packed mystery to uncover the centuries old skeletons lurking within the closets of the ship which we currently find ourselves on. Truly, you will never be the detective extraordinaire that it was prophesied you would become by taking the first steps on this once-in-a-lifeti- Hey, what’s that?”

Tori-san levelled his piercing stare towards the subject of Usopp’s stolen attention. Resting on the sea just in front of the horizon, in much the same way a duck swims on a motionless lake, was a ship. It was too far away for Usopp to discern any important information about it - other than that it was (probably) made of wood - but that didn’t stop him from turning to Tori-san and asking, “Do you know if it's your crew?”

There was a nod.

“What do we do now then? Sail closer and hope they don’t shoot at us? Or, wave a white flag and hope they don’t shoot at us anyway?” Usopp listed, ducking behind the edge of the crow’s nest in reaction to his own suggestions. Tori-san shook his head. Then he fluffed up his wings and nodded towards the dot at sea, giving the best bird-y equivalent of a smirk.

Then there was a drawn out ‘oh’ sound from Usopp.

“Sometimes I forget you can fly,” he awkwardly muttered in response. That tidbit earned him a swat on the arm, but also made Tori-san laugh so Usopp wasn’t worried.

The boy glanced back at the distant ship. It was strange to consider that they were close to reaching an end goal that Usopp hadn’t known even existed before the incident on the Marine base. Tori-san was travelling with him to get back home, to his family, and that goal was now firmly within his grasp. Surreal is a life at sea, Usopp wondered if this kind of thing happened often to seafarers or if he was just lucky in a strange way - a way that led to him almost being eaten by sea monsters and captured by evil traders.

“Will you be gone long? I think Sanuka is making lunch and I don’t want to eat double servings,” Usopp questioned with a hint of worry. Their companion’s talent for the culinary arts could be described as ‘dubious’ at best and ‘terrifyingly abysmal’ at worst, sliding anywhere between the two extremes. One can easily understand why Tori-san’s answer was a full-body shiver; that being said, Usopp was grateful when his companion shook his head before he turned to gaze assuredly towards the ship.

Confident Tori-san. Usopp had missed the sight of the bird acting like he could take on the world and win, it made him feel at ease. However, he understood the rocks forming in the pit of his stomach. Fear in the face of uncertainty was normal, but that did nothing to quell the itch that tapered to the end of Usopp’s fingertips - a manifestation of the encompassing urge to hold onto Tori-san and never let go.

“Just make sure to come back in one piece, otherwise I’ll be lonely,” Usopp offered. His heart was heavy under the weight of the embarrassment the words caused; although, they also acted as the pickaxe to clear away the cave in threatening to claim his airways. The wooden panels of the crow’s nest’s base were suddenly interesting enough to be the centre of his attention for no other reason than him wondering what type of tree they were made of.

Something brushed past his hair. Usopp didn’t need to look up to know what it was or what it meant. It was a gentle breeze fueled by a flickering candle that blew across his heart…

I’ll be back soon.

\---

“Marco!”

A boisterous greeting upon his contact with the ship was something that Marco had expected. However, the full extent of said greeting knocked him off his feet - literally.

The sensational juxtaposition between the worn deck of the ship and the semi-squishy bodies trying to dog pile him was interestingly uncomfortable. Marco’s first reaction was to force air back into his lungs before beginning his wiggly escape attempt. His movement prompted his crewmates to move aside to get a better look at their mildly crushed brother in his feathered glory.

The two groups stared at each other. Marco refused to break eye contact with the man in front of him while every person not catching his gaze blinked owlishly at him. His earlier relief quickly soured into energy sapping frustration as the moments were stretched out by the silence hanging over them.

He huffed at the inevitable question, “Is something wrong Commander? You haven’t been this quiet since Sumbo almost burned down the ship trying to fry an egg.”

“Hey! I was trying to boil it,” Sumbo corrected from within the crowd, overshadowing Marco’s second sigh.

That was a mess, the memory of which he would very much like to sweep under a large mental rug.

No, wait, focus... 

The question, which needed an answer, which Marco couldn’t answer.

He shook his head.

“So nothing’s wrong?” Was shot back from the group.

Another head shake.

“What’s wrong then? Are you sick?” The crew took a step away from him.

Okay, that earned them a glare.

“Did you run into trouble with Apis' family?” The question was asked laced with the promise of juicy scandal. A chorus of ‘oh’s and ‘ah’s sounded before the present crew members began to throw around too many questions for Marco to care about.

The man of the hour didn’t take long to be drawn in by the wall of sound being produced by the drama hounds that made up Marco’s crew. Apis’ voice trickled from the side of the group, “What’s this about me?”

The crowd quieted long enough for someone to shout, “Apis! Marco’s back! Maybe you can get something out of him, he’s not talking.”

Marco winced, in a way that he hoped was unnoticeable in this form, when Apis was pushed to the front of the crew. His crewmate’s hopeful expression changed the atmosphere of the moment and had Marco wondering if the universe hated him. Apis took a tentative step towards him and gently asked, “Commander, it’s great to see you. You’ve been gone for so long we were beginning to worry, not that we don’t think you can handle yourself. Is everyone okay back home? How’s Violet? Tot?”

Trapped under the thumb of an evil trading syndicate owner as hostages and possible future merchandise for his shady dealings. Working in the dirty, low quality kitchen of the aforementioned bastard like servants - instead of being treated as the house guests that they are supposed to be. His unscheduled (actually scheduled) visit ending in him being locked in his phoenix form without his powers and the ability to talk. In short, they were not in the best situation and neither was he.

Marco wondered if he should have written all of that down.

Writing stuff down...

Words…

An actual method of communication...

Why hadn’t he been writing stuff down?

“Commander Marco? You in there?” Apis leant into his personal space to tentatively ask.

\---

Usopp hadn’t known what to expect from his first experience of a pirate ship.

His childish and imaginative mind had supplied him with many ideas of nautical grandeur. Images of pirates every bit as dangerous as the monsters which inhabited the sea upon these people chose to sail were instantly broken by the group of men surrounding Tori-san from all sides. 

They had taken position alongside his, Tori-san’s and Sanuka’s ship in a maneuver that would have been impressive if they hadn’t also spent their time trying to be overly friendly in an obvious attempt of not scaring him - how old did they think he was? The invite to come onboard had quickly followed and, despite Sanuka’s refusal to leave the insides of the ship, Usopp had taken the offered rope. This was Tori-san’s family. He wanted to at least seem somewhat brave to them - you know, before he most likely cowered behind them in a fight.

Tori-san himself was poised over a page on a crate with a pencil in his mouth. That was new. The band of men grouped around him intently watched the bird fumble through writing something on the paper before mumbling amongst themselves. Their questions resulted in Tori-san scowling and gesturing towards the page.

Usopp took a step in their direction, eyes hoping to get a peek at whatever the adults were so intent on discussing, prior to being blocked by some of the crew. They wore a pair of matching grins which matched their cheery greeting, “Welcome to the crew little guy. Marco’s been telling us about your journey here, Usom. Very impressive how you beat those kind mappers and Marines.”

Usopp blinked up at them for a couple beats.

What?

“It’s Usopp and I did what?” He found himself voicing to the men. 

They glanced at each other before one meekly explained, “We’ve been having trouble understanding what exactly Marco’s trying to tell us. None of us realised how difficult it is to write using your mouth.”

The other brightened up after his companion’s admission, “Hey! Why don’t you give it a try? Marco mentioned that you two have been sailing for a while, maybe you’ll be better at understanding his bird scratch than us.”

“Um, I’m not sure about that. You guys are his family after all,” Usopp tried to reason as one of the men proceeded to pick him up. His feet swung uselessly in his weak and awkward struggle, “I think it’s considered rude to grab people suddenly, you know, so how about you put me down and I’ll just walk.”

“That’s funny kid. From what Marco’s been telling us, you’re part of the family already. Take this as your first taste of familial banter,” the man holding him joked as he held him above the crowd. Usopp cringed throughout the journey to the centre of the group, apologising whenever someone below got jostled; he was split between feeling thankful and being rooted to the spot by shame when the crewmember unceremoniously deposited on the edge of the crate in front of Tori-san. “Here you go Commander, all safely delivered.”

Tori-san took a moment to glare at the group’s collective laughter before turning to Usopp. There was a slight sidewards incline in his head that the boy answered with, “I’m fine.”

This seemed to be acceptable for the bird as Tori-san moved to scowl at the page stretched out next to them. From his current position Usopp could make out some words amidst the wall of slanted scribbles decorating the paper. “Your family is being held by Udin… has a Devil Fruit powers that took my own… I am trapped in this form…” His disjointed muttering ended when the words trailed off into a single squiggly line.

His eyes trailed upwards when a deep sigh came from beside him. Tori-san’s smile greeted him while the bird exuded an air of exasperation. Usopp glanced between his companion and the page whilst verbally piecing it together, “There’s a bad guy named Udin who took your powers. That’s why you’re still a bird instead of a badass pirate.”

There was a nod.

Tori-san rubbed his head. It was a small moment of contact ruined by the inclusion of cooing from the men around them. One of them even threw out the comment, “That’s so cute. It’s like you're sharing the same birdy brain.”

Even Usopp hid slightly from the glare Tori-san shot out. However, he also noticed the lack of genuine fire behind it and wondered if this was just another part of how Tori-san’s crew interacted with each other. Another member of the crew stepped up, a man who stared down at Usopp with tears welling up in his eyes, to cut through the jovial air by asking, “What about my family?”

The pair turned towards Tori-san at the sound of ruffled feathers. His beak pointed towards another area of text which Usopp put together aloud, “They’re working in a kitchen, safe but in possible danger.”

“They’re alive,” the man nearly sobbed. He sank into the stable side of the person standing beside him while Usopp silently watched in confusion. 

It was becoming clear to Usopp that he was missing half of a story he was acting a major character in. Like reading a book with most of the pages either ripped out or written in Tori-san’s mockery of true penmanship, he wondered if it was his place to ask the question, ‘what the heck is going on?’

However, that feeling was pushed aside when a muffled bell rang out across the ship. That sound caused an exodus from the deck fueled by the unabashed excitement of the crew. Usopp and Tori-san were the only people left when the footfalls of the men faded to near silence. 

The younger coughed into his hand to steal Tori-san’s attention away from where his crewmates had just been. He grinned at the awkwardly charmed gleam in his friend’s eyes and asked, “So, that’s your family? They seem nice.”

Tori-san rolled his eyes. Then he brought his wings up to create a small gap between them.

“There’s more of them? How many? Wait, do I want that to be a surprise for when I meet them?” Usopp’s questions continued past that point, becoming more self directed; yet, if he had taken a moment to look up then he would have seen the endearment glistening in Tori-san’s eyes.

\---

Maybe this was the universe’s way of showcasing just how much mayhem Marco should have been prepared for bringing Usopp with him. Although, it may just be his brothers being overenthusiastic idiots towards the boy they had collectively concluded was his son - after a much too short period of time to come to such a conclusion. They came to this grand realisation through reasoning such as ‘you’re the one that found him so you’re in charge of him’ and ‘his nose kind of makes him look like a bird, you’re a pair’.

Usopp became the centre of attention the moment they had set foot in the ship’s galley. Getting a new crewmate was always a reason for the Whitebeard Pirates to celebrate, but a lot of them had never interacted with children in the same setting. The boy was a cold front blowing through the otherwise balmy air of monotony this section of the crew had wanted to escape from for a few weeks. He was a new variable in an already complicated equation. Usopp was a set of keys being jingled in front of a group of bored dogs.

It was comforting to see him become another line in their sheet music. Yet, Marco needed to stop them from smothering the boy in their attempt to make him feel welcome over a hearty meal. Usopp’s every move reflected an inner wish to not have to eat the seven plates of food being placed in front of him. Sure, the boy was small but feeding him so much wouldn’t fix the problem. Marco slid away all but one of the plates, which Usopp gratefully brought towards him before digging in.

Apis sat opposite to the pair with his own plate. The youngest of the trio paused in his eating to flash the man a shaky smile. The interaction was kept brief by the man turning to Marco and informing, “Just got word that we’ve successfully attached the other ship behind us. Your other friend refuses to leave, even though we offered free food and company. They yelled something about us being ‘suspicious pirates’. Which just raises the question, ‘what exactly happened after your run in with Udin?’”

“Yeah Commander, I thought this trip wasn’t supposed to be an adventure,” was piped up from nearby.

Marco sighed. He knew this jabbing was destined to happen given the situation. The allure of an awe-inspiring undertaking was the flame to the moths that made up his crew and he had tried to be the breath to snuff out that flicker, at the start of this trip. This was payback, clean and simple. 

It’s too bad that he was trapped as a bird and couldn’t answer their questions. Yep, it was terrible that he didn’t have to take time away from his meal to recap an adventure full of danger, fights and unstable alliances. Marco felt awful as he took a bite of fresh salad.

Then Usopp started talking for him.

What took place was a beautifully told recount of their journey. It was a sugary mix of comedy, drama, Usopp’s penchant for exaggerating small details, complimenting Marco, that all came together to form a velvety batter of prose. The oven of Usopp’s passion for every step along their way to this point baked it into a deliciously cake-y story. And the icing on that multi layered wonder, everyone in the galley was close to tipping point on the edge of their seats as Usopp sprinkled in enough embellishments to have Marco rolling his eyes.

A small voice in his head chanted at him to finally ‘speak’ to Usopp by writing down everything he had wanted to tell the boy up until now. However, the mountainous collection of thoughts that existed within his heart were too messy to convey on paper. 

He needed more time to think.

“... And that’s how we found you guys, the end goal of our larger than life tale. A fair reward for days of strife… A warm meal with Tori-san,” Usopp finished with a grin and flourish of his arms in the direction of the aforementioned man. He settled down a moment later to continue eating.

Marco chose not to bat an eye when his family burst into a round of applause. They didn’t need to be encouraged to enjoy a good story, but Usopp’s way of stringing together words was something special. It was a shame that the story lacked a satisfying ending as of current.

“That’s an impressive kid you picked up Marco. Can’t wait to see what he’s like in a fight,” Apis mused between bites of food. Marco gazed up at the man as he went on, “Not that we’ll be including him in the battle against Udin.”

Udin…

That man would now be at the top of his list of priorities. Planning would begin tomorrow for a fight full of unknowns and possible hostages. Marco wasn’t one to actively plot to involve a child in a life threatening situation, so Usopp would need a babysitter - bodyguard, that was a better word - and a distraction from Marco’s past experiences of how easily Usopp found trouble in his fits of bravery.

Marco nodded distractedly at the man. His attention was placed on the eavesdropping child beside them.

This would be the one fight where Usopp was kept far, far away from danger.

\---

It hadn’t taken long for Usopp to find the ship’s armory after dinner. The place was a collection of wonder to his untrained eyes.

There were swords, blades and guns of every shape and size, each having names which existed outside of his realm of knowledge. Many other nameless weapons hung motionless on the walls - drawing Usopp’s attention like a silent bell. However, it was the barrels located at the back of the round which set his soul on fire.

The acrid smell that greeted him upon opening one of the rounded containers was a familiar shade of terrible. It was an old friend punching him in the gut as a substitute for a hug. Usopp couldn’t get enough of it.

It didn’t take long for him to set down his bag and find the leftover pellet shells buried deep within it. Then came the rhythm of filling each ball with the black gunpowder. Every little container had to be packed with near the same amount of substance, so the resulting blasts would be close to identical when it came time to use them. The movements involved in the process were beats on a finely tuned drum that danced along his arms, the melody of his breathing playing alongside it. A controlled situation. Usopp relished in the simple line of sealed pellets set out in front of him.

It was almost a shame when his vision was overtaken by cerulean fire. His surprise was evidenced by his back hitting the planks that had previously been behind him. The contact didn’t hurt much, but he still yelped, “Hey!”

A tritter came from above and Usopp pouted as Tori-san smugly stood over him.

“You’re not very funny. Bullying children makes you a bad person you know,” Usopp shot back while sitting up. The head pat that followed felt more like the physical equivalent of a chuckle than an apology. He swatted away the wing playing with his hair, “Fine, I forgive you. Just don’t expect the same mercy in the future.”

Tori-san huffed at that one.

Usopp had to swat away several more feathery attacks on his hair while asking, “What do you want? I thought you were busy making the greatest battle plan in history.” The bird responded by glancing around the room before admitting defeat and having his head. The tap of his claws against the floor reminded Usopp of a clock, a sound slowly putting him to sleep. 

Usopp blinked to dispel the sudden heaviness of his eyelids. Tori-san always had a way of making him comfortable, like a pillow made out of presence alone; he could also be used as a regular pillow, something which Usopp had taken advantage of more than he’d care to admit. They were sleeping buddies...

Wait, what time was it?

Ohhhh.

“It’s bedtime, huh?” Usopp asked with a grin. There was a nod and some light beak prodding at his back. Taking the hint, the boy stood from his place on the ground onto shaky legs. He was fully prepared to be poked in whatever direction Tori-san wanted for the evening, as long as it eventually led to a bed. 

However, Usopp remembered the baby-level explosives currently lovingly spread out at their feet. He riggled away from Tori-san’s wings, which were poised to corral him into the realm of dreams, and pleaded through a yawn, “Give me a minute, I need to clean up a bit.”

He used his temporary freedom to gather up his pellets. Tori-san wasted no time in raising an eyebrow at the objects which prompted Usopp to give him a closer look. He smiled. This was the first time showing someone one of his battle-ready inventions, “They’re the same as the one I used against that sea monster a while back. I needed gunpowder to make more of my patented ‘Exploding Stars’!”

Judging by Tori-san’s scowl, Usopp may have made a teeny tiny mistake in casually making explosives without permission. Yet, he also noticed a glimmer of interest so maybe he wouldn’t be banned from the armoury entirely. Usopp meekly laughed as he put away his invention, away from judgemental eyes, and meeting Tori-san’s gaze, “Don’t worry, I already went through the development phase back home. There’s no way they’ll blow up your ship while I’m making them.” The scowl failed to fully leave Tori-san’s face, but Usopp took it as a win when the bird subtly inclined his head towards the door.

They walked through the ship in silence. The quiet helped put into context the amount of time Usopp had spent alone within the bowels of the ship. Less people were milling about, creating noise, making it seem as if they were alone - like at the start of their adventure. A lot had changed since their time on that small, isolated island. Usopp let his mind wander back to the stagnant waters around that sandy islet and wondered where he would have been without Tori-san. 

The idea of simply giving up, allowing himself to become part of the sand beneath him, had been so tempting to his young mind. Just considering such an idea now sent needles scraping up his spine until they danced along the base of his neck. Before Tori-san Usopp’s acceptance of the oblivion resting at the edge of the soul had made sense. But now, he wanted to view events past the next day’s sunrise. Asking more of himself seemed easier with every step he took alongside his friend, reaching for the stars a more realistic task than breathing.

“Hey Tori-san, want to hear a bedtime story? It’s been a while,” Usopp asked when they met the cold night air. The first step outside was brisk. His arms prickled with goosebumps in the moonlight lit wind, maybe he should ask if they had any spare shirts lying around. 

That question died in his throat at the sight of Tori-san gazing up towards the sky. Usopp copied his stance to take in the draped expanse of glistening lights above them. Each glowing pinprick in the cobalt held promise of something otherworldly that had his heart dreaming past the horizon. They reminded him of the stories he had conjured up so far. Still, the moment felt new compared to the emotion fueled outbursts of the past.

“I know you liked the tale of the Moon Princess and Star Bird, but I’ve got fresh material for tonight. You’ll love it,” Usopp assured, not taking his attention away from the sky.

Tori-san cooed in response. The sound was near indistinguishable from the wind which worked to carry it along. While Usopp knew more about Tori-san origin, the illusion of him being magical filtered into these quiet moments and Usopp was recaptured by the naive child leaving a little East Blue island. He began his story holding that boy’s hand for stability, “There was once a ghost hunter. Well not really a hunter, he was more of a finder really.”

Expecting Tori-san to be used to more outlandish topics of his stories, Usopp was still caught off guard when his companion changed his focus to analyse his every move. He never knew what Tori-san was expecting to find within the deeply thought out choice of Usopp rubbing his arm to produce heat along the surface of his skin. “He travelled all over the world catching random ghosts in a net, any that crossed his path in fact. Over time people started to ask him to catch their own ghosts. That was fine, they would pay him with food and a place to sleep.” His voice betrayed some bigger meaning to his words, but Usopp refused to acknowledge the tired lilt his tone took, “But that also made his net a lot heavier. It dragged beside him with every step, hundreds of times larger than the little ghost finder.”

A crushing and inescapable weight which followed ones every move.

“Until one day he found a ghost looking for him. The ghost was familiar in the scary kind of way and terrified the Ghost Finder to the point where he dropped his net.”

Facing a ghost from the past. There was a ghost Usopp wouldn’t mind meeting, and one he was uncertain about ever confronting.

“Every ghost escaped at once, flying back to wherever they came from, finding home once again.”

Usopp wondered about his old home. His, once his mother’s, house just beside that slightly steep incline that led to the rest of the village. The path through the village that he had run across every day at one point - chasing a ghost of his own in a way.

“Except one, the ghost in front of him. It chose to break his net before running away into the horizon, to a place the Ghost Finder could never reach.”

A net, a slingshot, a tool by which to make the most of one’s life by choice rather than expectation, an exploitable weakness.

Tori-san stayed silent when the story trailed off.

A part of Usopp adamantly refused to mull over his own words. He was too tired to deal with himself, being close to dead on his feet while his train of thought signalled its arrival into a station for the night. 

Leave it to Tori-san to be the grown up and urge him towards a closed door on the other side of the deck. The sound of it swinging open before being shut barely registered above the muffled impacts of his slowly dragging feet on wooden planks. What did register was the sight of a very soft looking bed bathed in amber firelight. The two pillows resting at the head of it were twin clouds amidst a sea of foam textured ivory.

Usopp fell face first into that promising water with a sigh, “Soft.” This was heaven.

Tori-san was kind enough to nudge him through the semblance of a nightly routine before tucking him in. His beak was cold next to the fluffy bedding but Usopp took a moment to run his hand across it anyway. When Tori-san stopped moving he exhaustedly snickered, “You’re being kind of jumpy.” He deserved the poke from a beak that followed but still jokingly complained, “No, I’m sleepy. No attacking sleepy people.”

Sleepy people…

“You should sleep too. You’ve had a long day,” Usopp suggested by patting the space beside him. A nice soft bed for Tori-san to share with him which dipped under the bird’s weight. The sheets rumpled while he settled into a better position and Usopp rolled over to face him. There was a beat of silence between them before the latter mumbled, “This brings back memories. The bed’s a lot nicer this time though.”

Tori-san tiredly rolled his eyes at the attempt of light humour. He leant away from the bed to blow out the cabin’s lone candle, shrouding the room in pitch black.

The final words spoken across the gap between them that night were almost too muffled to hear, “Good night Marco.”

\---

…

Good night Usopp.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Note: I hate how the word embarrassment is spelt and can't quite figure out why
> 
> This chapter went in a lot of directions bc a whole lot needed to happen as set up for future (not filler-y) chapters so that's why it's kind of long. The last little scene made me tear up a little while writing it.
> 
> Tell me what you think and comment! I really appreciate the feedback and love hearing from everyone wonderful enough to take the time to read this fic.


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